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Speaker 1: Cool Zone Media. Hello, and welcome to Cool People Did

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Speaker 1: Cool Stuff. You're a weekly reminder that people can do

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Speaker 1: good things in the face of bad things. I guess

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Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be the middle name of the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I guess it could just be the tagline. I'm willing

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Speaker 1: to conceive that anyway. I'm your host, Margaret Kiljoy, and

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Speaker 1: my guest today is Joel Monique.

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Speaker 2: I hate not much.

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Speaker 1: We had a we had a break between parts one

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Speaker 1: and two, and I am covered in sawdust and I'm

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Speaker 1: not going to tell you why. I told them why.

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Speaker 2: I take a nap. For sure, I thought, okay, I

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Speaker 2: thought to take a nap too, all night on the

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Speaker 2: streets and then you're covered in sawdust, just redoing my kitchen,

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Speaker 2: just casual like. I was like, wow, yeah, no.

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Speaker 1: I I went out to my yard and which made

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Speaker 1: my dog happy, and I started taking a nap in

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Speaker 1: the hammock. And then I was like, what if I

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Speaker 1: go inside and do things. I'm just fucked. It'll be fine.

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Speaker 1: But our producer today is Sharen Hi, Seren.

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Speaker 2: Hi guys, wow, grill to be here.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, And our audio engineers Daniel Hi, Danel Hey, Dana Sreen.

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Speaker 1: We can't continue until you say Hi, Danel. I'm sorry

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Speaker 1: so sorry, Daniel.

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Speaker 2: Hi, we miss you so much, love you, thanks so

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Speaker 2: much for all you.

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Speaker 1: No, it's okay. See now, when I accidentally forget to

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Speaker 1: have everyone say hi Danel, it becomes like a thing.

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Speaker 1: My brain is totally wired normally. Anyway, our theme music

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Speaker 1: was written for us by un Woman and today is

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Speaker 1: part two in a two parter of I actually haven't

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Speaker 1: come up with the final title of it yet because

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Speaker 1: what this podcast was about changed at eleven pm last night.

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Speaker 1: But it's about the development of mutual aid and cooperative

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Speaker 1: economics within the black community in the United States, and

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Speaker 1: that's where we're at.

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Speaker 2: That's a solid title right there.

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Speaker 1: I know it's not going to like really like catch

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Speaker 1: people necessarily, but like it's descriptive and that is true

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Speaker 1: to the style of the time in terms of naming,

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Speaker 1: right well, except the crisis. The crisis is good name.

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Speaker 1: So anyway, what we're talking about, and at first, can

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Speaker 1: you I already told you that it was like kind

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Speaker 1: of insurance companies based they're not companies, but insurance organizations

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Speaker 1: were the first ones. Any any random guesses as to

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Speaker 1: what the first style of insurance was first.

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Speaker 2: Oh what was being ensured? Okay, so what I know

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Speaker 2: is post slavery, a lot formerly enslaved people would like

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Speaker 2: become essentially like a nitry servants work on farms and

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Speaker 2: they had like but they had to pay for all

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Speaker 2: their own farm equipment stuff. So maybe maybe like equipment

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Speaker 2: and things like that.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So that is a good guess because after emancipation,

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Speaker 1: some of the first worker cooperatives that folks develop are

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Speaker 1: to chip in together in order to buy equipment together.

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Speaker 1: But the first insurance organizations were burial societies.

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Speaker 2: Whoa also makes sense okay, Yeah, yeah, love and undertaker

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Speaker 2: society coming together. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So these existed all over the place for all kinds

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Speaker 1: of different communities. It wasn't just black communities doing this.

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Speaker 1: This was a way in which people during this era

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Speaker 1: took care of each other, right, but when white people

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Speaker 1: did it it was legal. Black people did it while

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Speaker 1: literally enslaved. And that's something. These were all over the US.

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Speaker 1: I sort of figured they'd be like, ah, and then

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Speaker 1: there was like three of them. No, there was a

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Speaker 1: lot more in that. Most of the black burial societies

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Speaker 1: were in the North where it was legal. Although it

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Speaker 1: was still highly content by the black codes and other

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Speaker 1: racist stuff that we'll talk about. But there was fuck

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Speaker 1: tons of people in the South self organizing illegally into

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Speaker 1: mutual aid organizations. As an example, every major city in

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Speaker 1: Virginia had one in the early eighteen hundreds. Basically, what

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Speaker 1: would happen is you'd put in money every month and

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Speaker 1: if you were sick, you would be taken care of.

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Speaker 1: It was also health insurance. They are called burial societies,

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Speaker 1: but they very very quickly expanded out beyond that. If

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Speaker 1: you're sick, you'd be taken care of, and if you died,

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Speaker 1: your burial expenses would be paid for and your family

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Speaker 1: would be taken care of. And it will never stop

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Speaker 1: blowing my mind that insurance companies start off as like

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Speaker 1: a radical act.

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Speaker 2: Right of just what a loving thing to do to

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Speaker 2: be like, hey, we all just pull our money then

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Speaker 2: and everyone of us gets sick, we could probably take

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Speaker 2: care of it and it'll be fine. And then to

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Speaker 2: just the taking care of because I mean, I never

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Speaker 2: considered what burial right must be like for people under slavery, Like.

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Speaker 1: I think it's different everywhere.

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Speaker 2: I know it's a little bit so like my family

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Speaker 2: is from Alabama, and we found my three or four

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Speaker 2: times great. She still lived in the the sheck after

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Speaker 2: emancipation that she lived in when she was in a slave.

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Speaker 2: She's stayed there her whole life. She's buried on that land. Okay.

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Speaker 2: And I know that there are a lot of like

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Speaker 2: smaller plantations that have like you know, burials, grounds or

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Speaker 2: whatever it needs buried there. It never occurred to me,

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Speaker 2: like what if you'll have enough land for a burial

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Speaker 2: or if the person who owns you quote unquote is

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Speaker 2: like you can't bury your day. That's so insane. There's

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Speaker 2: a lot to think.

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Speaker 1: About, no, I know. And it's like I want to

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Speaker 1: know more about burial customs because I feel like I

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Speaker 1: had this like picture of how slavery worked from my education.

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Speaker 1: And you know, the education I had was like not

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Speaker 1: like I was saved, the nightmare of like education that

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Speaker 1: was like and people were happier under slavery, Like I

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Speaker 1: didn't get any of that right, But I had this

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Speaker 1: kind of like one size fits all, like despotism, Like

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Speaker 1: when I found out that a lot of enslaved people

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Speaker 1: had money, it didn't it didn't work in my understanding.

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Speaker 2: We only sort of I think see it as in

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Speaker 2: the way the films depicted it, which is often like

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Speaker 2: child slavery, so like large, large, large usually cotton plantations. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: and there's the see I think it's kind about the

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Speaker 2: last time I was here. But there's those slave tit narratives,

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Speaker 2: which I think no longer the official titles. I apologize

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Speaker 2: the Smithsonian owns them. And basically, in like nineteen thirties,

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Speaker 2: a bunch of folks went around and they just recorded

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Speaker 2: the voices of the formerly enslaved, most of whom were

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Speaker 2: at this point in time, like were children when emancipation happened,

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Speaker 2: and so they were sharing their stories and it was

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Speaker 2: very interesting to hear, like people, how familial some of

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Speaker 2: these relationships were, Yeah, intertwined in every capacity that you

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Speaker 2: could possibly think of. And yet still the amount of

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Speaker 2: cruelty that can happen, especially if there's like two people

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Speaker 2: live here who are not considered people there are five

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Speaker 2: of us here, that's like insane dynamic to have to

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Speaker 2: live through your whole life, and particularly you get into

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Speaker 2: like the parent child relationships of it all. It's just ugh, yeah,

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Speaker 2: it's all very messy.

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Speaker 1: No, it's so much messier than we I mean, the

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Speaker 1: version that I grew up with wasn't a like rosy version, right,

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Speaker 1: but it was not complicated by like the idea of

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Speaker 1: like the first time I read about like how a

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Speaker 1: guy who was owned had to go out and get

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Speaker 1: a job and then give his wages to his to

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Speaker 1: his owner.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm just.

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Speaker 1: Like, man, it's so bad. I mean, it's like bad

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Speaker 1: no matter what. But it's just like when they you're like, wow,

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Speaker 1: we find like new ways to be fucked up whenever

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Speaker 1: we look deeper into the past.

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Speaker 2: You know, Yeah, it's it's much more like emotionally sinister,

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Speaker 2: I think, where when it's depicted as a business and

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Speaker 2: largely impersonal, then you can sort of or at least

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Speaker 2: I felt oftentimes we were just writing it off as

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Speaker 2: being like, oh, well that's how things were, and Lincoln

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Speaker 2: became president and we got rid of that thing. Like

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Speaker 2: that was like essentially my educational for four three years

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Speaker 2: slaves here. It was terrible. Most people hated it, but

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Speaker 2: what could we do? And then Lincoln like solve the problem.

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Speaker 2: But it's like.

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Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, single handedly because he was a person. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: So they had these burial societies and they had to

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Speaker 1: be organized in a criminal fashion because it was criminal. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it was illegal in a lot of places, uh, for

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Speaker 1: folks to gather in large groups without a white man present.

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Speaker 1: So what they would do is amongst themselves, they'd pick

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Speaker 1: one person who could read or write, so usually a

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Speaker 1: house slave, and that person would set up with a

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Speaker 1: ledger book and folks would come in and buy ones

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Speaker 1: or twos and slip money to the secretary. Sometimes they

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Speaker 1: would just like come into church and sit down next

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Speaker 1: to the secretary at church and be like, oh, you know,

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Speaker 1: pass pass them a little money or whatever.

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Speaker 2: We do our weed deals in the alley outside of church.

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Speaker 1: Right, it's basically the weed dealing of Yeah, and each

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Speaker 1: member who was written down in this ledger, which was

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Speaker 1: like hidden you know, under the blanket at night of

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Speaker 1: the you know, the secretary had to take this real seriously, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Each member of the society was known by a number

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Speaker 1: instead of a name for secrecy. So you'd come that

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Speaker 1: you sit down and be like, hello, I am number

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Speaker 1: four or whatever.

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Speaker 2: How this okay? So the other thing I'm learning about

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Speaker 2: a lot lately, not a lot. Let me slow down.

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Speaker 2: I've been getting interested in numbers running, which essentially like

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Speaker 2: just the lottery that they used to run on the side.

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Speaker 1: Wow, okay, yeah.

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Speaker 2: And like so like a lot of like entrepreneural black folks,

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Speaker 2: and it sounds very similar ways would just be around

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Speaker 2: in the neighborhood. They had a trusted system. You want

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Speaker 2: to play it in the lottery, cool, slip us your money,

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Speaker 2: totally fine, and then we just pay out winners and

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Speaker 2: the rest goes into like funding the next one and

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Speaker 2: like super community based and like fun. And it's technically

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Speaker 2: illegal because it's the but you know, and that's exactly

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Speaker 2: why all of a sudden, and this is like pre

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Speaker 2: are official gaming code, but they got real intense about

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Speaker 2: being like you may not run numbers in your neighborhood,

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Speaker 2: creat but it sounds like a lot of the same

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Speaker 2: systems that were implemented here maybe got used for numbers

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Speaker 2: games later, which is really fascinating.

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Speaker 1: That wouldn't surprise me. And so these these burial societies developed,

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Speaker 1: a lot of them developed into mutual aid societies. A

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Speaker 1: lot of these places were providing you with your clothes

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Speaker 1: and your shelter and the necessities of life. So basically

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Speaker 1: a system of like like people you know, later white

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Speaker 1: socialists are cribbing the like, from each according to ability,

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Speaker 1: to each according to need. You know, I don't know

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Speaker 1: there's a direct lineage. I'm not sure who was looking

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Speaker 1: over whose shoulder, but certainly this came before that particular quote,

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Speaker 1: which wasn't Marx, but I can't remember who it was

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Speaker 1: off the top of my head. Whatever. I looked into

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Speaker 1: it because for a while I was going to get

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Speaker 1: giant block letter according to ability according to need tattooed

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Speaker 1: on my arms because I'm a nerd.

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Speaker 2: Listen, Okay, where does that mean things should be on

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Speaker 2: your body? I know that's a good one, but also

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Speaker 2: I understand or somebody'd be like, oh gosh, that was

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Speaker 2: a lot yeah energy behind that one statement.

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Speaker 1: For me, and I'm like, I'm not a Marxist and

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Speaker 1: it's like mostly associated with him and they, you know,

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Speaker 1: but I really care about that sentiment.

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Speaker 2: You know, it's a good one. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So mutual aid society started with how do we afford

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Speaker 1: to get buried and end up building hospitals and shit.

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Speaker 1: Secret societies started building or orphanages and other charitable organizations.

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Speaker 1: I think more of this is happening in the North,

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Speaker 1: but I'm not. I had a hard time parsing out exactly,

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Speaker 1: and this is the soil that later cooperative businesses and

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Speaker 1: banks grew out of. One study showed that out of

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Speaker 1: two hundred and thirty six of these societies, I think

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Speaker 1: this is the South. I think this is Maryland, which

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Speaker 1: was the South at the time of two hundred and

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Speaker 1: thirty six of these societies, seventy nine were operated out

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Speaker 1: of churches, and ninety two were built out of secret societies. Wow. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And so that leads to a lot of other ones

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Speaker 1: that were entirely informal. As far as I can tell,

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Speaker 1: some of this.

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Speaker 2: Stuff is like, man, when you went in history, a

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Speaker 2: lot of times, I just feel like you get struggled.

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Speaker 2: That would be like, of course, obviously, like why did

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Speaker 2: I not Why wasn't I consciously thinking about this before? Right,

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Speaker 2: They wouldn't let black people participate in regular society, like

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Speaker 2: of course they had to have like all these underground, yeah,

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Speaker 2: organized systems in order to like how are we like

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Speaker 2: banking with our money? How are we getting around? Like

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Speaker 2: it's yeah, it's kind of fat. It also is giving

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Speaker 2: me new insight into black people's obsession with secret societies. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: About in a an analytical sense, someone was like, okay, Luminati,

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Speaker 2: da da da da. But now, oh, we were everywhere

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Speaker 2: constantly being secret of course, Okay, sure, and I get

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Speaker 2: why we're currently to this day still obsessed with the

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Speaker 2: idea of secret societies running things. That's really funny.

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Speaker 1: Well, and it's like secret societies one of the things

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Speaker 1: that I'm obsessed with how power forms and shapes. I

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Speaker 1: grew up thinking like, oh, the state that is the

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Speaker 1: source of all power, right, And then you're like, oh, no,

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Speaker 1: wonder the state hates gangs, right, because gangs are, for

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Speaker 1: better or worse, another way of organizing power within a community.

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Speaker 1: One hundred right, And still were cops. Although they're associated

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Speaker 1: with the state, they're often independent from the state in

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Speaker 1: very terrifying ways. And then I realized that all I mean,

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Speaker 1: the state is basically just the biggest gang is taken over, right,

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Speaker 1: And so secret societ and all of these like decentralized

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Speaker 1: attempts at centralizing power, you know, are really fascinating to me.

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Speaker 1: And they were way way bigger of a deal back

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Speaker 1: in the day. We no longer think about them in

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Speaker 1: the same way. And I think, and I'm a little

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Speaker 1: bit off my own total knowledge train here. I think

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Speaker 1: that the rise of the nation state, which is a

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Speaker 1: fairly modern concept just the past couple hundred years, I

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Speaker 1: think that that's a big part of it. But to

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Speaker 1: these mutual lated societies, there were not two hundred and

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Speaker 1: thirty six of them total. These are the examples two

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Speaker 1: hundred and thirty six that were cataloged by I think

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Speaker 1: to boys. Philly alone had one hundred of them in

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Speaker 1: the eighteen thirties. Baltimore had thirty at around the same time.

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Speaker 1: The first ones, especially the secret societies, I think they

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Speaker 1: started off for men. Only by the seventeen nineties women

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Speaker 1: had their own, and soon they were essentially running all

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Speaker 1: this shit. A lot of their ones started off like

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Speaker 1: all women, right, and then slowly I think people were like,

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Speaker 1: your's is better, Can I join yours?

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Speaker 2: I'm sure. I think what often frequently happens too is

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Speaker 2: women are left with young boys who are sort of

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Speaker 2: in that middle age, not white men, not you know,

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Speaker 2: young enough to just be with the children. And I

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Speaker 2: think frequently, you know, we see that they're going to

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Speaker 2: force so ino spaces to be like, I guess everyone

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Speaker 2: get it. We're just taking care of everybody, Like just

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Speaker 2: what else can we do?

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Speaker 1: That makes sense. Yeah, and so we're to skip ahead

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Speaker 1: just so I have just other numbers to play with.

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Speaker 1: By eighteen ninety eight in New York City, fifty two

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Speaker 1: percent of all Black women in New York City we're

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Speaker 1: in organizers of these mutual aid like we're involved in

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Speaker 1: organizing these Well, fifteen percent of black men were involved

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Speaker 1: in mutual aid societies.

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Speaker 2: Can come on, women, show them what's up.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, So you've got the roots of cooperativism coming up

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Speaker 1: through mutual aid societies. But importantly, du Bois and others

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Speaker 1: track the origin of all this into the history of

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Speaker 1: black insurrection and that these can't be separated so completely. Fundamentally,

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Speaker 1: we shouldn't be enslaved anymore. Is an economic proposition, right,

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Speaker 1: because you're attempting to change the economic relationship between you

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Speaker 1: and the people who have real funny ideas about who's

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Speaker 1: in charge one percent. So in this sociological study full

301
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Speaker 1: of charts and graphs, du Bois spends an awful lot

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Speaker 1: of time talking about the underground railroad and tying it

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Speaker 1: into all of this cooperative economic stuff. The underground railroad,

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Speaker 1: of course, is the thing that's famous for how white

305
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Speaker 1: people use it to try and feel better about being white,

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Speaker 1: because besides John Brown, it's like the only place that

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Speaker 1: those those of us who are white can look for

308
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Speaker 1: role models is like a couple Quakers, John Brown and

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Speaker 1: the Underground Railroad, Right, they.

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Speaker 2: Be clinging to them. They're like, no, the Quakers are

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Speaker 2: really out here just constantly helping black people. You know,

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Speaker 2: a handful of them.

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Speaker 1: Some of them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely do boys.

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Speaker 1: Just a fucking wrecking ball through white myths. As always.

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Speaker 1: I've decided he's the kool aid Man of sociology.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, someone make a gift, someone animated.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. He comes in pointing out that the Underground Railroad

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Speaker 1: was the result of black organization. By eighteen fifty, a

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Speaker 1: fucking hundred thousand people had made their way to freedom

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Speaker 1: by way of this organization over the course of about

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Speaker 1: twenty years. Yes, and that's, by my really rough and

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Speaker 1: improper math, that's about one in every forty slaves, because

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Speaker 1: there were about four million people enslaved in this country

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Speaker 1: at emancipation fifteen years later.

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Speaker 2: Wow.

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Speaker 1: I always figure I'll do a whole series about it

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Speaker 1: one of these days, because it's one of the only

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Speaker 1: genuinely cool things that I learned about in school, you know,

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Speaker 1: and it as far as I can tell. I know,

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Speaker 1: I keep using these like superlative statements in this particular series,

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Speaker 1: but I'm holding to all of them. I think that

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Speaker 1: the Underground Railroad is one of the greatest achievements of

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Speaker 1: human liberty and history.

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Speaker 2: It absolutely is it absolutely Okay, Okay, two books don't

336
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Speaker 2: to recommend again. I maybe recommended them last time, so

337
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Speaker 2: I apologize it said, well, definitely one maybe not. The

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Speaker 2: other Wake The Hidden History of Women Led Slave Revolts.

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Speaker 1: Oh, I have that one because you recommended it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, So it's a graphic novel. It's beautifully illustrated.

341
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Speaker 2: This woman is a historian. She's got her doctor in history,

342
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Speaker 2: and her specialty is going in and trying to read

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Speaker 2: between the lines to find missing history because oftentimes, you know,

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Speaker 2: in sleave, people's names were written down ages. There's so

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Speaker 2: much missing from historical documents. She's really good at uncovering

346
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Speaker 2: that kind of stuff. The other one is called Brooding

347
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Speaker 2: Over Bloody Revenge, which chronicles the enslaved people who killed

348
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Speaker 2: their masters. And what I found really interesting in the

349
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Speaker 2: book is the historian who worked on this she only

350
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Speaker 2: focused on stories where people confess and where she was

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Speaker 2: reasonably sure that they had actually committed the murders as

352
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Speaker 2: opposed to just being accused. And I say all this

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Speaker 2: to say it was really interesting in reading these books

354
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Speaker 2: and getting deep into slaver You know, I grew up

355
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Speaker 2: in and it says that was like slaves tried to

356
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Speaker 2: run away, period, But the idea of fighting back and

357
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Speaker 2: organizing was not introduced in my education at all. Right,

358
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Speaker 2: And I think what makes the Underground a side room

359
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Speaker 2: its obvious success in freeing people, which is brilliant and

360
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Speaker 2: amazing and such an intensely coordinated organization that's really beautiful

361
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Speaker 2: is it's one of the few bold pieces of history

362
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Speaker 2: that everyone can look at and see and be like, No,

363
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Speaker 2: like enslaved people were not only brilliant, but like capable,

364
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Speaker 2: Like it brings a level I think of humanity that's

365
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Speaker 2: often missing, Like so many people I think are a

366
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Speaker 2: shame to come from, like enslaved people, Like there's a

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Speaker 2: really deep shame or human or there's a lot of

368
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Speaker 2: frustration with the way those stories have been told for

369
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Speaker 2: a myriad of reasons, and I think many are valid,

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Speaker 2: but my gosh, I mean, I just don't think how

371
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Speaker 2: you can look at something like the underground railroad, knowing

372
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Speaker 2: the amount of oppression people were under, and not be like, Wow,

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Speaker 2: it's really fucking cool I descended from folks were able

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Speaker 2: to accomplish this, Like it's really amazing.

375
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Speaker 1: I'd be so fucking proud, because like, yeah, because like

376
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Speaker 1: we always get shown enslaved people as either acquiescing to

377
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Speaker 1: suffering or like sometimes nobly which is the worst of all,

378
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Speaker 1: or when they try to rebel or run away, it's

379
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Speaker 1: like impotently, right, there's always the scene of and I

380
00:20:55,640 --> 00:20:59,760
Speaker 1: it's like worth pointing out that slave Catcher was a

381
00:21:00,160 --> 00:21:02,680
Speaker 1: police comes from and a lot of people got it

382
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Speaker 1: real bad because they tried to get the fuck out,

383
00:21:05,440 --> 00:21:08,680
Speaker 1: you know, but like a lot of people fucking succeeded.

384
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Speaker 1: It's not like these like oh, well, you know, I

385
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Speaker 1: mean that one guy, like oh yeah, that those one

386
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Speaker 1: hundred thousand yeah one people, cities.

387
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Speaker 2: And communities and legacies of families. Yeah. Have you seen

388
00:21:22,280 --> 00:21:23,800
Speaker 2: Barry Jenkins underground yet?

389
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Speaker 1: I don't think so?

390
00:21:26,359 --> 00:21:31,240
Speaker 2: It is? Okay, So it's a fictionalized story that actually

391
00:21:31,240 --> 00:21:34,320
Speaker 2: sort of envisions the underground real world as like a

392
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Speaker 2: train that ran underground. Oh yeah, yeah, uh huh, The

393
00:21:37,160 --> 00:21:40,119
Speaker 2: cinematography is gorgeous, but it's one of for me, for

394
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Speaker 2: my money anyway, the best humanizing of the enslaved experience. Right, Like,

395
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Speaker 2: So you have a girl who's she's she's fucking pissed,

396
00:21:50,760 --> 00:21:54,159
Speaker 2: so angry at everybody she can't till down. And she

397
00:21:54,359 --> 00:21:59,160
Speaker 2: also the racist ideals have been so ingrained within her

398
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Speaker 2: that the underground rower journey for her is like unlearning

399
00:22:03,840 --> 00:22:07,400
Speaker 2: all of this hate that's been taught to her, learning

400
00:22:08,280 --> 00:22:11,520
Speaker 2: what does safety in America actually look like? She lands

401
00:22:11,520 --> 00:22:14,960
Speaker 2: in towns that are like small spoiler, but the first

402
00:22:14,960 --> 00:22:17,640
Speaker 2: time she lands in, when she gets out, they're secretly

403
00:22:18,640 --> 00:22:22,040
Speaker 2: sterilizing everybody. So yeah, free, but all of you are

404
00:22:22,119 --> 00:22:25,640
Speaker 2: getting sterilized. Yeah, what can we do? And so she's

405
00:22:25,640 --> 00:22:28,320
Speaker 2: going to these retalispy and it's so man, it's a

406
00:22:28,359 --> 00:22:33,080
Speaker 2: really beautiful story. I I it's hard watched, extremely hard watched,

407
00:22:33,080 --> 00:22:35,040
Speaker 2: but I'm so well told.

408
00:22:36,480 --> 00:22:43,840
Speaker 1: So this whole thing is built from black work with solidarity,

409
00:22:43,960 --> 00:22:47,040
Speaker 1: real solidarity, the kind of solidarity that involves risk from

410
00:22:47,119 --> 00:22:51,680
Speaker 1: white abolitionists, but even more risk from black people. More

411
00:22:51,720 --> 00:22:55,080
Speaker 1: than five hundred people a year who'd already escaped North

412
00:22:55,160 --> 00:22:58,440
Speaker 1: went back to the fucking South to spread the word

413
00:22:58,480 --> 00:23:02,920
Speaker 1: and rescue more people the balls, Like I know that's

414
00:23:02,960 --> 00:23:05,919
Speaker 1: I know. I'd like to imagine that that would be me.

415
00:23:06,200 --> 00:23:08,760
Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, I.

416
00:23:08,720 --> 00:23:11,359
Speaker 2: Feel fairy confident it wouldn't I would love to imagine,

417
00:23:11,440 --> 00:23:12,920
Speaker 2: Like yes, And then I went back my life's bread

418
00:23:12,960 --> 00:23:15,679
Speaker 2: were but like man getting to a space that actually

419
00:23:15,720 --> 00:23:18,199
Speaker 2: just feels safe, or you have to like stress for

420
00:23:18,240 --> 00:23:19,160
Speaker 2: once in your life.

421
00:23:19,240 --> 00:23:23,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, But if you don't want to

422
00:23:23,560 --> 00:23:28,320
Speaker 1: stress in your life, you can come with us to

423
00:23:28,400 --> 00:23:43,000
Speaker 1: the magical land of advertising. Here we go and we're back.

424
00:23:46,400 --> 00:23:49,439
Speaker 1: What I keep reading about over and over in this

425
00:23:49,440 --> 00:23:51,960
Speaker 1: particular research is that the overall vibe of free black

426
00:23:52,000 --> 00:23:56,440
Speaker 1: people in both the North and the South wasn't I've

427
00:23:56,480 --> 00:23:59,359
Speaker 1: got mind fuck you, but a real intense involvement in

428
00:23:59,400 --> 00:24:02,440
Speaker 1: the betterment of lives of other black people. Free black

429
00:24:02,440 --> 00:24:05,560
Speaker 1: people were often the central organizers of mutual aid societies

430
00:24:05,640 --> 00:24:08,920
Speaker 1: or would contribute disproportionately to them, including like in the South. Right,

431
00:24:09,840 --> 00:24:12,200
Speaker 1: they would also risk their lives and I believe the

432
00:24:12,280 --> 00:24:17,240
Speaker 1: freedom working on the underground railroad, one black man in

433
00:24:17,280 --> 00:24:21,040
Speaker 1: Ohio would lead people in a closed carriage through racist neighborhoods.

434
00:24:22,000 --> 00:24:25,480
Speaker 1: A one porter turned the metaphorical railroad into a literal one.

435
00:24:25,520 --> 00:24:27,360
Speaker 1: He was a porter of a sleeping car that ran

436
00:24:27,400 --> 00:24:31,399
Speaker 1: through Illinois, WI people in the sleeping car. Du Bois

437
00:24:31,440 --> 00:24:33,879
Speaker 1: tells the story about a black man in Ohio who

438
00:24:34,040 --> 00:24:36,399
Speaker 1: would go to the Virginia border, pretending to be a

439
00:24:36,480 --> 00:24:39,440
Speaker 1: drunk so that white people would ignore him, and then

440
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:43,200
Speaker 1: tell enslaved folks exactly how to run away in great

441
00:24:43,240 --> 00:24:45,480
Speaker 1: detail with all the information they needed.

442
00:24:46,080 --> 00:24:48,879
Speaker 2: People are so awesome. Oh my god, I know, so

443
00:24:49,040 --> 00:24:49,960
Speaker 2: fucking cool.

444
00:24:50,600 --> 00:24:54,159
Speaker 1: This guy's name isn't even in this book that I read, right, Yeah,

445
00:24:54,200 --> 00:24:57,840
Speaker 1: he did more for the world than almost anyone alive today. Yeah.

446
00:24:58,160 --> 00:25:01,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, not many people measuring up to this. Dude's like,

447
00:25:01,160 --> 00:25:05,199
Speaker 2: what a brave act, what a brilliant way of like

448
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:10,840
Speaker 2: escaping detection and also spreading the word like ingenious. Yeah.

449
00:25:10,880 --> 00:25:14,000
Speaker 1: And if you're thinking to yourself, waite, Ohio doesn't touch Virginia.

450
00:25:14,119 --> 00:25:16,919
Speaker 1: This is before West Virginia seceeded from Virginia over its

451
00:25:17,040 --> 00:25:20,919
Speaker 1: lack of interest in dying for slavery. I always have

452
00:25:20,960 --> 00:25:23,000
Speaker 1: to shout out. I feel like once an episode I

453
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:25,960
Speaker 1: have to point out that West Virginia seceded from Virginia

454
00:25:26,040 --> 00:25:30,960
Speaker 1: to anyway whatever. I live in the Greater Virginia. The

455
00:25:31,440 --> 00:25:35,840
Speaker 1: one Another Conductor was a prominent black business owner in Detroit.

456
00:25:35,880 --> 00:25:38,840
Speaker 1: His name was William Lambert. He operated his businesses as

457
00:25:38,880 --> 00:25:41,879
Speaker 1: safe houses and apparently helped thirty thousand people escape to

458
00:25:41,920 --> 00:25:44,800
Speaker 1: Canada over the course of thirty two years. That is

459
00:25:45,200 --> 00:25:49,800
Speaker 1: three people a day. That shit adds up. Wow, I'm

460
00:25:50,040 --> 00:25:52,280
Speaker 1: once again I do very rough math on this show.

461
00:25:52,760 --> 00:25:56,240
Speaker 1: At one point, this fucking scumbag slaver showed up chasing

462
00:25:56,280 --> 00:25:58,440
Speaker 1: a guy. So William Lambert, he's like a kind of

463
00:25:58,480 --> 00:26:02,320
Speaker 1: important person economically into so he puts pressure on the

464
00:26:02,359 --> 00:26:06,119
Speaker 1: city into arresting the slaver on completely bullshit charges that

465
00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:09,399
Speaker 1: he knows won't stick, just to get the guy in

466
00:26:09,520 --> 00:26:12,240
Speaker 1: jail long enough for the runaway to get the fuck

467
00:26:12,280 --> 00:26:13,760
Speaker 1: away to Canada use the.

468
00:26:13,760 --> 00:26:17,399
Speaker 2: System against them. That's so cool. Oh my gosh, I

469
00:26:17,480 --> 00:26:17,879
Speaker 2: love that.

470
00:26:18,960 --> 00:26:22,120
Speaker 1: And the response to this was pretty wild. It is

471
00:26:22,240 --> 00:26:24,800
Speaker 1: almost certainly what helped lead to the Fugitive Slave Act

472
00:26:24,800 --> 00:26:27,560
Speaker 1: of eighteen fifty, which helped protect the rights of slavers

473
00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:30,639
Speaker 1: in the North while they were like off chasing their property.

474
00:26:30,760 --> 00:26:33,440
Speaker 1: But whether you can control the backlash.

475
00:26:33,520 --> 00:26:35,600
Speaker 2: You know, I know they were gagged. They that said

476
00:26:36,320 --> 00:26:40,320
Speaker 2: systems coming for me. No, I am a white man.

477
00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:43,720
Speaker 1: What the hell they get confused fast? I am my

478
00:26:43,840 --> 00:26:48,240
Speaker 1: property escaped. It's even though it's capable of docking and whatever.

479
00:26:49,400 --> 00:26:53,800
Speaker 1: And this underground railroad there was no central leadership, there

480
00:26:53,880 --> 00:26:57,159
Speaker 1: was no central committee. It was organized, but what you

481
00:26:57,359 --> 00:26:59,879
Speaker 1: buy what you might call affinity groups and even just

482
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:05,760
Speaker 1: own individuals. So the railroad is an international horizontal criminal

483
00:27:05,840 --> 00:27:10,480
Speaker 1: association built out of mutual aid, free association, cross race solidarity.

484
00:27:11,680 --> 00:27:16,080
Speaker 1: Like it's just like all the things I like, you know, Yeah,

485
00:27:16,320 --> 00:27:19,639
Speaker 1: It's also where John Brown looked to find the people

486
00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:23,399
Speaker 1: with which with whom to conspire, and then you know,

487
00:27:23,680 --> 00:27:26,320
Speaker 1: sparked the war that ended slavery, which he fucking did.

488
00:27:26,359 --> 00:27:28,359
Speaker 1: And I am still mad at people trying to pretend

489
00:27:28,400 --> 00:27:31,000
Speaker 1: like John Brown fucking failed. He fucking won. He just

490
00:27:31,080 --> 00:27:34,879
Speaker 1: died in the process. Imagine for a moment, believing in

491
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:39,560
Speaker 1: Christianity and thinking I have to survive is a prerequisite

492
00:27:39,640 --> 00:27:44,359
Speaker 1: to winning, like right is sacrificing yourself to get killed

493
00:27:44,359 --> 00:27:48,200
Speaker 1: by the state is the entire focal point of this religion.

494
00:27:48,040 --> 00:27:52,280
Speaker 2: Right right? Yeah, that a real one. Uh An absolute

495
00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:57,280
Speaker 2: fee on the ground I will stand in my truth

496
00:27:57,359 --> 00:27:59,840
Speaker 2: kind of fella. Yeah, I'm an impressive dude.

497
00:28:00,320 --> 00:28:04,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, And like, as always, it's a little bit an

498
00:28:04,720 --> 00:28:07,080
Speaker 1: issue that we pay a lot more attention to him

499
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:11,240
Speaker 1: than we pay two black people who did the overwhelming

500
00:28:11,280 --> 00:28:15,919
Speaker 1: majority of the work. But like it's still cool, Like

501
00:28:15,960 --> 00:28:17,520
Speaker 1: that's not his fault, you know.

502
00:28:17,440 --> 00:28:22,120
Speaker 2: It's absolutely not his fault. And in fact, without him

503
00:28:22,240 --> 00:28:24,680
Speaker 2: does the war, you know what I mean. Like otherwise

504
00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:28,280
Speaker 2: it's just oh, black people, who I forget, what's the

505
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:31,600
Speaker 2: fake disease they made up for why slaves run away?

506
00:28:32,119 --> 00:28:34,919
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I forgot this. I don't remember the name.

507
00:28:35,119 --> 00:28:38,160
Speaker 2: I can't recall it. Either it's very dumb, or they're like, oh,

508
00:28:38,480 --> 00:28:40,880
Speaker 2: they're running away because they have this disease that needs

509
00:28:40,960 --> 00:28:44,200
Speaker 2: to be cured, and so with that you can easily

510
00:28:44,200 --> 00:28:47,520
Speaker 2: explain away anything they're doing. And it takes a dude

511
00:28:47,520 --> 00:28:50,360
Speaker 2: who looks like the guy's in power to be like, actually,

512
00:28:50,400 --> 00:28:53,000
Speaker 2: this is effing bullshit and I'm not gonna stand for

513
00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:55,640
Speaker 2: it sometimes for them to pay attention.

514
00:28:56,360 --> 00:29:00,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of the railroad ran through Appalachia because

515
00:29:00,360 --> 00:29:03,800
Speaker 1: Appalachi is really culturally distinct from the rest of the South,

516
00:29:03,920 --> 00:29:06,720
Speaker 1: and because it's remote and rugged, people would hide in

517
00:29:06,760 --> 00:29:09,719
Speaker 1: the limestone caves and stuff. And it is not a

518
00:29:09,720 --> 00:29:14,960
Speaker 1: coincidence that John Brown did his thing here. People talk

519
00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:16,959
Speaker 1: a lot about the conductors of the railroad, and I

520
00:29:17,080 --> 00:29:19,200
Speaker 1: like them. It's good and worthwhile to talk about them.

521
00:29:19,560 --> 00:29:21,600
Speaker 1: But there were also, and I'm making this term up,

522
00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:27,040
Speaker 1: there were enforcers for the underground Railroad after the Fugitive

523
00:29:27,080 --> 00:29:29,560
Speaker 1: Slave Act, which made it easier for set you know,

524
00:29:29,760 --> 00:29:31,959
Speaker 1: Southern assholes to go and try and catch people. Right,

525
00:29:33,360 --> 00:29:35,440
Speaker 1: John Brown and others who don't get named, Even though

526
00:29:35,480 --> 00:29:38,360
Speaker 1: everyone else involved in this is black, their names are

527
00:29:38,360 --> 00:29:40,160
Speaker 1: not recorded to the same prominence, or at least I

528
00:29:40,160 --> 00:29:41,800
Speaker 1: didn't run across them started.

529
00:29:42,040 --> 00:29:42,560
Speaker 2: It happens.

530
00:29:43,120 --> 00:29:47,160
Speaker 1: The League of Gileadites Gileadites, which is a good name,

531
00:29:47,240 --> 00:29:48,720
Speaker 1: even if I don't know how to pronounce it, because

532
00:29:48,720 --> 00:29:53,200
Speaker 1: I am a lapsed Catholic and not a anyway, And

533
00:29:53,280 --> 00:29:56,360
Speaker 1: this existed. This league existed to protect the people escaping

534
00:29:56,360 --> 00:30:01,000
Speaker 1: from slavery, like with guns and bombs and s hell yeah,

535
00:30:01,680 --> 00:30:06,040
Speaker 1: they went fucking hard. Anyone who snitched in their ranks

536
00:30:06,400 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 1: was killed death.

537
00:30:07,640 --> 00:30:08,040
Speaker 2: Okay.

538
00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:11,280
Speaker 1: Their rules included should one of your number be arrested.

539
00:30:11,440 --> 00:30:13,920
Speaker 1: You must collect together as quickly as possible so as

540
00:30:13,920 --> 00:30:19,240
Speaker 1: to outnumber your adversaries Mario. And another rule was let

541
00:30:19,320 --> 00:30:22,560
Speaker 1: no able bodied man appear on the ground unequipped or

542
00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:26,400
Speaker 1: with his weapons exposed to view. So like, be smart,

543
00:30:26,400 --> 00:30:30,160
Speaker 1: you got carrier gun fucking everywhere. Another one was make

544
00:30:30,280 --> 00:30:32,840
Speaker 1: clean work with your enemies, and be sure you meddle,

545
00:30:32,880 --> 00:30:37,280
Speaker 1: not with others. Okay, so like vengeance for the people

546
00:30:37,320 --> 00:30:39,720
Speaker 1: who need vengeance, but don't don't fuck with anyone.

547
00:30:39,400 --> 00:30:43,080
Speaker 2: Else, right, don't don't bring trouble to our door. That's unnecessary. Yeah.

548
00:30:43,160 --> 00:30:46,200
Speaker 1: Oh oh no, they're they're about trouble to doors. I'll

549
00:30:46,200 --> 00:30:48,760
Speaker 1: talk about in a seconds, okay. Another one of their

550
00:30:48,840 --> 00:30:51,960
Speaker 1: rules was stand by one another and your friends while

551
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:55,320
Speaker 1: a drop of blood remains, and be hanged if you must,

552
00:30:55,360 --> 00:30:58,560
Speaker 1: But tell no tales out of school, make no confessions.

553
00:30:59,160 --> 00:31:00,760
Speaker 2: Okay, Okay, I love.

554
00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:03,920
Speaker 1: Pirate rules, I know, right. This is my favorite of

555
00:31:03,960 --> 00:31:08,440
Speaker 1: their rules. After affecting a rescue, if you are assailed,

556
00:31:08,960 --> 00:31:11,680
Speaker 1: go into the houses of your most prominent and influential

557
00:31:11,720 --> 00:31:15,320
Speaker 1: white friends with your wives, and that will effectually fasten

558
00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:18,480
Speaker 1: upon them the suspicion of being connected with you, and

559
00:31:18,560 --> 00:31:21,080
Speaker 1: will compel them to make a common cause with you.

560
00:31:24,240 --> 00:31:26,760
Speaker 2: Bring your friends kicking and screaming, We do not care.

561
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:28,240
Speaker 2: That's amazing.

562
00:31:28,480 --> 00:31:30,640
Speaker 1: If you're fucked with, go to a white friend, not

563
00:31:30,640 --> 00:31:32,840
Speaker 1: because the white friend will save you, but because this

564
00:31:32,880 --> 00:31:35,840
Speaker 1: will force the white friend to get off the fucking fence.

565
00:31:36,760 --> 00:31:39,080
Speaker 2: Yeah. I we have to put in a position where

566
00:31:39,120 --> 00:31:40,160
Speaker 2: they have to say something.

567
00:31:40,880 --> 00:31:41,080
Speaker 1: Yeah.

568
00:31:41,160 --> 00:31:46,520
Speaker 2: Wow. I love these systems of organization, especially as I

569
00:31:46,560 --> 00:31:53,760
Speaker 2: look more into violent resistance. You know, these are actions

570
00:31:53,800 --> 00:31:58,280
Speaker 2: that move needles. As unfortunate as it is that these

571
00:31:58,280 --> 00:32:01,560
Speaker 2: things inevitably happen. Yeah, people don't listen.

572
00:32:02,120 --> 00:32:05,600
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just self defense and community defense.

573
00:32:06,160 --> 00:32:06,360
Speaker 2: You know.

574
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:13,120
Speaker 1: They also distributed instructions about how to disrupt courtrooms with

575
00:32:13,240 --> 00:32:16,880
Speaker 1: quote freely burning gunpowder. I think this isn't like bombs.

576
00:32:16,920 --> 00:32:19,880
Speaker 1: I think this is like a flash, you know, right

577
00:32:20,680 --> 00:32:23,760
Speaker 1: to help prisoners escape. If anyone knows about a book

578
00:32:23,800 --> 00:32:26,360
Speaker 1: about these people, let me know. This is like a

579
00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:29,480
Speaker 1: side quest in my research. But I like, they're fucking

580
00:32:29,720 --> 00:32:33,960
Speaker 1: They're cool. And what did the folks do when they

581
00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:38,120
Speaker 1: successfully made it to safety. Well a lot of them

582
00:32:38,240 --> 00:32:42,440
Speaker 1: entered into cooperative societies like not like Beyond even like

583
00:32:42,480 --> 00:32:44,680
Speaker 1: mutual aid stuff, like stuff that just straight up is

584
00:32:44,720 --> 00:32:49,800
Speaker 1: like communes and you know what later would get called

585
00:32:49,840 --> 00:32:54,360
Speaker 1: socialism and communism but usually democratic instead, and we'll talk

586
00:32:54,360 --> 00:32:57,200
Speaker 1: about it. In the South, you had these maroon communities

587
00:32:57,240 --> 00:32:59,760
Speaker 1: like we were talking about, and they're sort of informally

588
00:33:00,080 --> 00:33:03,280
Speaker 1: and you know, set up, and they're often communal and cooperative.

589
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:07,160
Speaker 1: I don't think they're universally. So in the North you

590
00:33:07,200 --> 00:33:11,480
Speaker 1: had black intentional communities, and a lot of these were

591
00:33:11,480 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 1: like not as cool as they could be. A lot

592
00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:15,960
Speaker 1: of them were set up by white abolitionists in these

593
00:33:16,120 --> 00:33:20,200
Speaker 1: like very paternalistic, annoying ways. The white abolitionists were like

594
00:33:20,320 --> 00:33:22,680
Speaker 1: real spotty, you know, you.

595
00:33:22,640 --> 00:33:26,000
Speaker 2: Know, yeah, yeah, they're they're middle of the laying people

596
00:33:26,200 --> 00:33:29,280
Speaker 2: would work within the system to defeat the system.

597
00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:32,840
Speaker 1: Yeah you know. And then a lot of the ones

598
00:33:32,880 --> 00:33:35,360
Speaker 1: who said they were doing that were also like providing

599
00:33:35,760 --> 00:33:42,320
Speaker 1: firearms to John Brown, right, but like you know, okay,

600
00:33:42,320 --> 00:33:44,840
Speaker 1: So some of these societies that were set up were

601
00:33:44,840 --> 00:33:48,920
Speaker 1: for profit farmers working collectively owned fields. So it was

602
00:33:48,960 --> 00:33:50,680
Speaker 1: like not for profit for a boss, it was like

603
00:33:50,720 --> 00:33:54,000
Speaker 1: for profit for all of the workers collectively, and which

604
00:33:54,040 --> 00:33:57,520
Speaker 1: is what worker cooperativism is. Just before anyone was calling

605
00:33:57,560 --> 00:34:00,800
Speaker 1: things that the most successful these and I think the

606
00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:03,680
Speaker 1: most numerous were in Canada. A lot of people were like, look,

607
00:34:03,720 --> 00:34:08,319
Speaker 1: the North isn't far enough going out, Yeah, but there

608
00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:11,759
Speaker 1: were some in the US. Two. The Wilberforce Colony in

609
00:34:11,800 --> 00:34:14,120
Speaker 1: Canada built its own schools that were so good that

610
00:34:14,160 --> 00:34:16,359
Speaker 1: the neighboring white folks sent their kids to it too.

611
00:34:16,920 --> 00:34:22,080
Speaker 2: Mother of god. Yeah, can you imagine how what was

612
00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:26,600
Speaker 2: the education life? Yeah? Must have been in sensational Wow.

613
00:34:27,160 --> 00:34:29,520
Speaker 1: Well we talk about that. We did this episode about

614
00:34:29,560 --> 00:34:34,480
Speaker 1: the black origin of EMTs and ambulance service in Pittsburgh

615
00:34:34,520 --> 00:34:36,440
Speaker 1: and like, way more recently than you'd think. I think

616
00:34:36,440 --> 00:34:37,240
Speaker 1: it's the seventies.

617
00:34:37,680 --> 00:34:38,080
Speaker 2: Oh wow.

618
00:34:38,920 --> 00:34:42,560
Speaker 1: And it served the black community and came out of

619
00:34:42,600 --> 00:34:46,759
Speaker 1: the black community. And then all these white neighborhoods were like, wait,

620
00:34:47,400 --> 00:34:49,319
Speaker 1: we want the empts to come here. We don't care

621
00:34:49,360 --> 00:34:51,719
Speaker 1: that they're black. Could we just not die that neighborhood?

622
00:34:51,719 --> 00:34:54,760
Speaker 1: People don't die when they get sick or od or whatever?

623
00:34:54,840 --> 00:34:58,200
Speaker 1: You know. Wow, Although then other people were like, no,

624
00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:01,839
Speaker 1: I would rather die than let this black paramedic touch

625
00:35:01,880 --> 00:35:04,640
Speaker 1: me or whatever, which I'm like, good, then die, I mean,

626
00:35:06,120 --> 00:35:09,560
Speaker 1: and take care of people. It's not like your terms

627
00:35:09,600 --> 00:35:10,480
Speaker 1: are acceptable.

628
00:35:11,440 --> 00:35:13,600
Speaker 2: They cannot waste their time, and you can die. It'll

629
00:35:13,640 --> 00:35:15,640
Speaker 2: be great. Yeah.

630
00:35:16,040 --> 00:35:18,719
Speaker 1: Some of these communes, not the EMTs, it's one hundred

631
00:35:18,800 --> 00:35:20,799
Speaker 1: years later. Some of these communes were set up by

632
00:35:20,840 --> 00:35:25,560
Speaker 1: white people in weird and condescending ways. In Tennessee, there's

633
00:35:25,600 --> 00:35:28,279
Speaker 1: this white lady. She's an early suffragist, and she's like,

634
00:35:28,320 --> 00:35:30,839
Speaker 1: I've got a plan. All right, let's hear her plan.

635
00:35:31,440 --> 00:35:34,000
Speaker 1: She's going to buy hundreds of acres in Tennessee and

636
00:35:34,040 --> 00:35:37,279
Speaker 1: then buy like a hundred enslave people and don't set

637
00:35:37,280 --> 00:35:40,200
Speaker 1: them free right away, but but build a commune where

638
00:35:40,239 --> 00:35:43,640
Speaker 1: they collectively labor and profit and then buy their freedom,

639
00:35:44,360 --> 00:35:46,680
Speaker 1: whereupon they can go and colonize Africa.

640
00:35:47,120 --> 00:35:50,640
Speaker 2: And did you just double slavery?

641
00:35:50,719 --> 00:35:52,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, a little bit.

642
00:35:53,080 --> 00:35:56,759
Speaker 2: She said, I bought you. It's not much better. H

643
00:35:56,800 --> 00:35:59,600
Speaker 2: you can maybe buy your freedom based off prices that

644
00:35:59,680 --> 00:36:00,759
Speaker 2: I decide.

645
00:36:01,320 --> 00:36:02,440
Speaker 1: I think it's the Yeah, I think it's what she

646
00:36:02,520 --> 00:36:06,080
Speaker 1: paid for them, and she's not profiting off of them.

647
00:36:06,320 --> 00:36:12,520
Speaker 1: They are like she's wildly misguided, but she's like she's

648
00:36:12,560 --> 00:36:14,520
Speaker 1: not trying to Oh, I'm going to make a buck

649
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:17,880
Speaker 1: here too, Okay. But she's like she's like, oh, you

650
00:36:17,920 --> 00:36:20,160
Speaker 1: will collectively work on this land that I'm going to

651
00:36:20,239 --> 00:36:24,000
Speaker 1: set up for you all. But it's super fucking patronizing

652
00:36:24,360 --> 00:36:28,239
Speaker 1: and it didn't work out. Instead, it became this like

653
00:36:28,320 --> 00:36:31,920
Speaker 1: weird integrated community that was harassed by local racists, but

654
00:36:32,040 --> 00:36:35,600
Speaker 1: itself was too racist because black people weren't allowed to

655
00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:38,240
Speaker 1: hold positions of authority because they hadn't been like properly

656
00:36:38,440 --> 00:36:43,359
Speaker 1: educated enough to learn how to let people tell people

657
00:36:43,360 --> 00:36:46,480
Speaker 1: what to do or whatever. So exhausting, I know, in

658
00:36:46,520 --> 00:36:48,920
Speaker 1: the end it fell apart, and so she sent all

659
00:36:48,920 --> 00:36:50,719
Speaker 1: the people that she owned a Haiti to be free.

660
00:36:52,080 --> 00:36:54,640
Speaker 2: You know what, girl, at the end there you pulled

661
00:36:54,640 --> 00:36:57,200
Speaker 2: it out. You did it? She said, where were they

662
00:36:57,200 --> 00:36:59,640
Speaker 2: able to get themselves free? Haiti? Do y'all want to

663
00:36:59,640 --> 00:37:00,120
Speaker 2: go there?

664
00:37:00,719 --> 00:37:01,040
Speaker 1: Yeah?

665
00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:02,600
Speaker 2: That's amazing.

666
00:37:03,280 --> 00:37:06,040
Speaker 1: She genuinely was trying to do right, and in the

667
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:08,920
Speaker 1: end died right and along the way had some fucking

668
00:37:09,000 --> 00:37:10,680
Speaker 1: wacky ideas and you know what.

669
00:37:10,760 --> 00:37:14,759
Speaker 2: Bless a wealthy white woman doing her psyche. Yeah, it

670
00:37:14,840 --> 00:37:17,000
Speaker 2: was trying. Yeah, oh my god.

671
00:37:17,600 --> 00:37:21,520
Speaker 1: Then there was the Northampton Association of Education and Industry.

672
00:37:21,719 --> 00:37:23,360
Speaker 1: And this is actually way cooler, and that you just

673
00:37:23,400 --> 00:37:26,360
Speaker 1: sort of it sounds pretty forgettable, right, This is a

674
00:37:26,400 --> 00:37:30,240
Speaker 1: whole different kind of cooperative, utopian commune. It is racially

675
00:37:30,239 --> 00:37:35,279
Speaker 1: integrated from the start and intentionally, and white black people

676
00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:37,760
Speaker 1: were as much leaders of the community as white people.

677
00:37:38,680 --> 00:37:41,359
Speaker 1: So journal Truth, one of the most famous abolitionists, and

678
00:37:41,560 --> 00:37:44,520
Speaker 1: David Ruggles, one of the lead organizers of the railroad,

679
00:37:45,000 --> 00:37:47,120
Speaker 1: both lived there for a while. And this is actually

680
00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:49,759
Speaker 1: where sojournal Truth got radicalized. As far as I can tell,

681
00:37:49,960 --> 00:37:54,080
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, and the whole thing sounds like a weird

682
00:37:54,080 --> 00:37:58,239
Speaker 1: sci fi novel cult because hear me out, but not

683
00:37:58,280 --> 00:38:01,719
Speaker 1: a bad way. It's no weird way. They are radically egalitarian.

684
00:38:01,760 --> 00:38:05,680
Speaker 1: That's like their whole thing. And they their profit thing

685
00:38:05,719 --> 00:38:07,480
Speaker 1: that they try to do is that they operate a

686
00:38:07,520 --> 00:38:10,279
Speaker 1: silk mill because they have decided and I do not

687
00:38:10,480 --> 00:38:15,080
Speaker 1: know why the silkworm is a symbol of democracy. It

688
00:38:15,160 --> 00:38:16,520
Speaker 1: must have been the style at the time.

689
00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:20,840
Speaker 2: They don't work together though, it's just one Yeah, it's fine.

690
00:38:20,960 --> 00:38:21,920
Speaker 2: It worked for them.

691
00:38:22,120 --> 00:38:26,319
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so they have this like silkworm commune where

692
00:38:26,320 --> 00:38:29,200
Speaker 1: they're like, the silkworm is the best. And then while

693
00:38:29,200 --> 00:38:31,280
Speaker 1: they lived there, they were secretly part of a secret

694
00:38:31,280 --> 00:38:34,480
Speaker 1: militant society that liberated enslave people. I would read a

695
00:38:34,600 --> 00:38:39,839
Speaker 1: Ya novel set in the Northampton Association of Education and Industry, You.

696
00:38:39,760 --> 00:38:45,440
Speaker 2: Can Eat Beautiful Silks and also radical revolution, Let's go already.

697
00:38:47,440 --> 00:38:51,799
Speaker 1: Frederick Douglas visited all the time and he wrote about it, quote,

698
00:38:51,880 --> 00:38:53,879
Speaker 1: the place and the people struck me as the most

699
00:38:53,880 --> 00:38:56,520
Speaker 1: democratic I have ever met. It was a place to

700
00:38:56,640 --> 00:39:01,840
Speaker 1: extinguish aristocratic pretensions. There was no high, no low, no masters,

701
00:39:02,000 --> 00:39:05,880
Speaker 1: no servants, no white, and no black. And he referred

702
00:39:05,880 --> 00:39:07,520
Speaker 1: to it as the only place he'd ever been in

703
00:39:07,520 --> 00:39:10,640
Speaker 1: the US where his skin color wasn't used against him. Wow.

704
00:39:11,520 --> 00:39:14,120
Speaker 1: Sojourner Truth was elected the head of the communities like

705
00:39:14,200 --> 00:39:17,399
Speaker 1: laundry and oversaw the white coworkers who had elected her

706
00:39:17,440 --> 00:39:21,120
Speaker 1: into this position. And this was fucking mind blowing to

707
00:39:21,160 --> 00:39:22,680
Speaker 1: the people who've learned about it.

708
00:39:23,320 --> 00:39:25,840
Speaker 2: I can only imagine it like you'll have a black lady.

709
00:39:25,680 --> 00:39:28,920
Speaker 1: Boss like yeah, and they're like, oh, we picked her.

710
00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:33,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, Oh that bar too her two. Yeah, we like her.

711
00:39:33,280 --> 00:39:35,280
Speaker 1: She's a great leader, and I think she gets paid

712
00:39:35,320 --> 00:39:35,720
Speaker 1: the same.

713
00:39:36,360 --> 00:39:36,800
Speaker 2: Wow.

714
00:39:37,000 --> 00:39:39,080
Speaker 1: The place only lasted a few years, I want to say,

715
00:39:39,080 --> 00:39:40,560
Speaker 1: four four and a half years or something like that.

716
00:39:41,719 --> 00:39:43,520
Speaker 1: Most of the storians say it fell apart because the

717
00:39:43,560 --> 00:39:46,719
Speaker 1: silk mill couldn't turn a profit, Sojourner Truth said that

718
00:39:46,760 --> 00:39:50,040
Speaker 1: individualism got in the way and that people like were

719
00:39:50,480 --> 00:39:53,640
Speaker 1: I suspect it's both. You know, probably most of the

720
00:39:53,760 --> 00:39:56,680
Speaker 1: US communes were the paternalistic things set up by white people.

721
00:39:56,719 --> 00:39:59,400
Speaker 1: But there is a standout exception. One of the coolest

722
00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:01,600
Speaker 1: things I've ever heard heard about there is. And I

723
00:40:01,640 --> 00:40:04,279
Speaker 1: read about cool things for a living, and a lot

724
00:40:04,360 --> 00:40:07,040
Speaker 1: of the coolest things I find are like footnotes or

725
00:40:07,080 --> 00:40:09,360
Speaker 1: I get a paragraph about it where I'm like I

726
00:40:09,400 --> 00:40:15,320
Speaker 1: would read a boring PhD dissertation on this. The Combahi

727
00:40:15,440 --> 00:40:20,319
Speaker 1: River colony on the South Carolina and Georgia coast Basically,

728
00:40:20,560 --> 00:40:22,200
Speaker 1: when a bunch of black men from the South went

729
00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:25,200
Speaker 1: to go join the Union army, hundreds of black women,

730
00:40:25,480 --> 00:40:28,920
Speaker 1: mostly the wives of those Union soldiers, went over and

731
00:40:28,960 --> 00:40:32,319
Speaker 1: squatted unused farmland and grew food and took care of

732
00:40:32,360 --> 00:40:37,880
Speaker 1: each other and had a all women like workers cooperative

733
00:40:37,960 --> 00:40:39,959
Speaker 1: mutual aid society in the middle of a war.

734
00:40:40,960 --> 00:40:41,760
Speaker 2: Wow.

735
00:40:42,560 --> 00:40:46,279
Speaker 1: To quote author Jessica Gordon Nemhart, they refused to work

736
00:40:46,320 --> 00:40:48,880
Speaker 1: for whites and were proud of their handicrafts and cotton

737
00:40:48,920 --> 00:40:52,080
Speaker 1: crop as well as their independence. And that's like all

738
00:40:52,120 --> 00:40:54,200
Speaker 1: I know about them. I've now told you everything I

739
00:40:54,239 --> 00:40:54,839
Speaker 1: know about them.

740
00:40:55,040 --> 00:41:01,520
Speaker 2: I'm thirsty for more. I know, were you Because here's

741
00:41:01,520 --> 00:41:07,160
Speaker 2: the thing. If they're in the field, like if they're

742
00:41:07,160 --> 00:41:09,920
Speaker 2: not working for white folks, there's a war going on,

743
00:41:10,400 --> 00:41:14,839
Speaker 2: they're doing more than like sewing uniforms, Like who are

744
00:41:14,840 --> 00:41:17,879
Speaker 2: they are they fixing like guns and stuff? Are they

745
00:41:18,080 --> 00:41:21,240
Speaker 2: helping with like military operations like planning and stuff.

746
00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:26,279
Speaker 1: I think that they're pretty separatist. I don't I don't

747
00:41:26,280 --> 00:41:30,560
Speaker 1: get the impression that they are like specifically like there

748
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:34,359
Speaker 1: to contribute to the war effort. Okay, although I mean

749
00:41:35,680 --> 00:41:39,120
Speaker 1: they're certainly each one of them doing that is one

750
00:41:39,239 --> 00:41:42,799
Speaker 1: less worker in the Confederate economics, right right, you know.

751
00:41:43,239 --> 00:41:45,520
Speaker 1: But no, I think that they were like because the South,

752
00:41:46,960 --> 00:41:49,879
Speaker 1: for some strange reason, black people on the South had

753
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:54,880
Speaker 1: really mixed feelings about the Union Army, right like, And

754
00:41:54,920 --> 00:41:56,960
Speaker 1: I only I know a bit about this. I did

755
00:41:56,960 --> 00:41:59,600
Speaker 1: an episode right at the beginning of the show called

756
00:41:59,600 --> 00:42:02,279
Speaker 1: the Civil War within the Civil War, and it was

757
00:42:02,360 --> 00:42:06,239
Speaker 1: about the South's Civil War, in which both white and

758
00:42:06,320 --> 00:42:09,279
Speaker 1: black people fought tooth and nail against the Confederacy and

759
00:42:09,320 --> 00:42:12,520
Speaker 1: set up like seceded several different places, and there was

760
00:42:12,560 --> 00:42:15,640
Speaker 1: a lot of people who worked for the Union Army

761
00:42:15,680 --> 00:42:19,359
Speaker 1: as like basically guerrilla soldiers and like irregulars. But like

762
00:42:20,880 --> 00:42:23,719
Speaker 1: the North formed a beachhead on this one coastal town

763
00:42:23,760 --> 00:42:25,560
Speaker 1: in the South that I totally forget the name of

764
00:42:25,600 --> 00:42:28,000
Speaker 1: because this is two years ago that I did this research,

765
00:42:28,440 --> 00:42:30,840
Speaker 1: and they like went around and were trying to recruit

766
00:42:30,880 --> 00:42:32,879
Speaker 1: black people to join the Union Army, and a lot

767
00:42:32,920 --> 00:42:35,920
Speaker 1: of them were like, you gotta pay us, You're going

768
00:42:35,960 --> 00:42:39,280
Speaker 1: to give us the same uniforms, and they're all like, oh, maybe,

769
00:42:39,320 --> 00:42:41,160
Speaker 1: and they're like no, we're good.

770
00:42:41,920 --> 00:42:45,440
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think there's like some leftover resentment from the

771
00:42:45,480 --> 00:42:47,400
Speaker 2: Revolutionary because there was like a lot of thoughts in

772
00:42:47,400 --> 00:42:49,399
Speaker 2: the Revolutionary War, if you fight, was it the French

773
00:42:49,400 --> 00:42:53,080
Speaker 2: who were offering freedom the British is a British, right, Yeah,

774
00:42:53,120 --> 00:42:56,439
Speaker 2: And they did it, Yeah, they did it. And then there

775
00:42:56,360 --> 00:42:58,839
Speaker 2: were people who fought on the American side expecting to

776
00:42:58,880 --> 00:43:01,600
Speaker 2: get the same situation and they did not. And I

777
00:43:01,640 --> 00:43:06,000
Speaker 2: think there's a lot of like yeah, full Grandpappy ones,

778
00:43:06,520 --> 00:43:07,160
Speaker 2: not gonna.

779
00:43:06,920 --> 00:43:11,239
Speaker 1: Get me sort of no totally and like they're not

780
00:43:11,440 --> 00:43:14,040
Speaker 1: totally wrong. I mean a fuck ton of people did

781
00:43:14,080 --> 00:43:15,640
Speaker 1: come from the South and then fight for the North

782
00:43:15,680 --> 00:43:18,080
Speaker 1: and including at that beachhead. They eventually worked it out

783
00:43:18,120 --> 00:43:21,520
Speaker 1: and there was like they're like yah whatever anyway, So

784
00:43:23,440 --> 00:43:29,200
Speaker 1: eventually the Civil War ended, the good guys win. Well,

785
00:43:29,239 --> 00:43:33,799
Speaker 1: the the better than whatever we talk, you know, And

786
00:43:35,040 --> 00:43:37,160
Speaker 1: the history of Black America in a lot of ways

787
00:43:37,239 --> 00:43:40,440
Speaker 1: is the history of literally four million people winning their

788
00:43:40,480 --> 00:43:44,520
Speaker 1: freedom and then being dropped into capitalist society, which famously

789
00:43:44,880 --> 00:43:47,600
Speaker 1: doesn't really offer a lot to people who have nothing.

790
00:43:48,239 --> 00:43:51,719
Speaker 1: But folks didn't have nothing. They had each other, they

791
00:43:51,719 --> 00:43:55,800
Speaker 1: had two centuries of resistance culture, and they had these ads.

792
00:43:56,040 --> 00:43:58,000
Speaker 1: Oh god, that's the worst one I've ever done. I'm

793
00:43:58,000 --> 00:43:58,480
Speaker 1: so sorry.

794
00:43:58,440 --> 00:44:02,319
Speaker 2: I really they got me, Margaret. I liked it.

795
00:44:02,440 --> 00:44:07,600
Speaker 1: Okay, thanks, thanks, because there's ads now speaking of capitalism.

796
00:44:07,840 --> 00:44:08,520
Speaker 1: Here we go.

797
00:44:17,640 --> 00:44:18,440
Speaker 2: And we're back.

798
00:44:20,320 --> 00:44:22,520
Speaker 1: After black people won their freedom by throwing the biggest

799
00:44:22,560 --> 00:44:24,560
Speaker 1: general strike the US has ever seen and the largest

800
00:44:24,600 --> 00:44:28,560
Speaker 1: transfer of labor power from one army to another. And

801
00:44:28,600 --> 00:44:30,440
Speaker 1: when I say this, I don't mean to discount the

802
00:44:30,480 --> 00:44:33,319
Speaker 1: bravery and sacrifice of union soldiers white and black like,

803
00:44:34,080 --> 00:44:38,080
Speaker 1: but you know, there are usually talked about. So I

804
00:44:38,120 --> 00:44:42,560
Speaker 1: talk about the workers a lot to folks set about

805
00:44:42,920 --> 00:44:46,960
Speaker 1: in earnest building economic power. They did it overall by

806
00:44:47,000 --> 00:44:51,279
Speaker 1: working together, all while fighting really really active resistance from

807
00:44:51,320 --> 00:44:54,680
Speaker 1: white supremacy on both systemic and individual levels. And this

808
00:44:54,719 --> 00:44:56,920
Speaker 1: is not to discount the work of the reconstruction. I

809
00:44:56,920 --> 00:45:00,680
Speaker 1: actually think that the attempts at reconstruction were one of

810
00:45:00,719 --> 00:45:04,000
Speaker 1: the more interesting like social programs the United States is

811
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:07,480
Speaker 1: ever trying to run. And it just it was being

812
00:45:07,560 --> 00:45:11,279
Speaker 1: run by an occupying army, and that had anyway whatever,

813
00:45:11,320 --> 00:45:13,239
Speaker 1: I'm not that's not enough of my script for me

814
00:45:13,320 --> 00:45:17,279
Speaker 1: to feel certain about. But what I do know is

815
00:45:17,280 --> 00:45:20,400
Speaker 1: that in an eighteen sixty nine report from the Freedman's Bureau,

816
00:45:20,480 --> 00:45:23,960
Speaker 1: this one kind of shocked me, honestly. This eighteen sixty

817
00:45:24,040 --> 00:45:26,320
Speaker 1: nine reported that out of the four million people freed

818
00:45:26,320 --> 00:45:30,080
Speaker 1: from slavery, about one and two hundred of these people

819
00:45:30,360 --> 00:45:36,080
Speaker 1: became quote an object of public charity. So only one

820
00:45:36,200 --> 00:45:37,680
Speaker 1: in two hundred people.

821
00:45:37,920 --> 00:45:39,360
Speaker 2: Oh needed charity.

822
00:45:39,400 --> 00:45:43,160
Speaker 1: It became relying on charity after being dropped into a

823
00:45:43,200 --> 00:45:46,239
Speaker 1: capitalist healthscape from a much worse healthscape.

824
00:45:46,600 --> 00:45:48,839
Speaker 2: That is inspiring.

825
00:45:49,560 --> 00:45:53,040
Speaker 1: And the report is basically saying, like, holy shit, how

826
00:45:53,080 --> 00:45:54,759
Speaker 1: did this happen? You know?

827
00:45:55,160 --> 00:45:56,080
Speaker 2: Yeah?

828
00:45:56,120 --> 00:45:58,560
Speaker 1: And I think that there's some like I read that

829
00:45:58,680 --> 00:46:02,960
Speaker 1: chunk like several highs because I'm it's still whatever. I

830
00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:05,200
Speaker 1: think that there's like maybe ways that people are defining

831
00:46:05,239 --> 00:46:08,640
Speaker 1: certain things. But overall, the people writing this report from

832
00:46:08,640 --> 00:46:11,400
Speaker 1: the Freedman's Bureau are shocked by how little support people

833
00:46:12,360 --> 00:46:15,480
Speaker 1: are reliant on from the federal government. It wasn't that

834
00:46:15,520 --> 00:46:18,040
Speaker 1: people didn't need or get help, It's that they figured

835
00:46:18,040 --> 00:46:20,240
Speaker 1: out how to help one another, as they've been doing forever.

836
00:46:20,560 --> 00:46:24,200
Speaker 1: Is the conjecture that I am working with this part

837
00:46:24,239 --> 00:46:26,120
Speaker 1: blows my brain enough that I'm a little bit like

838
00:46:26,400 --> 00:46:29,279
Speaker 1: really really du boys, am I reading you wrong? Like

839
00:46:29,360 --> 00:46:32,440
Speaker 1: I don't know, you know whatever? It's fucking great and

840
00:46:32,520 --> 00:46:36,360
Speaker 1: like land reform was promised at the beginning of the

841
00:46:36,400 --> 00:46:39,160
Speaker 1: Civil War, which land reform did not happen. This is

842
00:46:39,160 --> 00:46:41,279
Speaker 1: where you break up the big parcels of owned by

843
00:46:41,320 --> 00:46:44,000
Speaker 1: old plantation owners and distribute it to the small farmers.

844
00:46:44,400 --> 00:46:47,400
Speaker 1: This is the stuff that has led to leftist revolutions

845
00:46:47,440 --> 00:46:50,880
Speaker 1: all around the world for hundreds of years. Basically the

846
00:46:51,280 --> 00:46:55,960
Speaker 1: breaking up of these like land monopolies. So instead of

847
00:46:56,000 --> 00:46:59,920
Speaker 1: making farmers, the government made laborers. So an awful lot

848
00:46:59,920 --> 00:47:04,720
Speaker 1: of these laborers worked together to become cooperative owners instead.

849
00:47:05,640 --> 00:47:07,520
Speaker 1: And they did this in a lot of ways. One

850
00:47:07,560 --> 00:47:09,319
Speaker 1: of the simplest was they pulled their money and they

851
00:47:09,320 --> 00:47:12,600
Speaker 1: bought land together. One merchant described ten black men who

852
00:47:12,640 --> 00:47:15,120
Speaker 1: came in and collectively bought seven hundred acres in cash.

853
00:47:16,719 --> 00:47:18,360
Speaker 2: Oh, I know that felt good.

854
00:47:18,920 --> 00:47:24,040
Speaker 1: I know, I know, like my family's been here for

855
00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:26,120
Speaker 1: two hundred years. I'm fucking getting this.

856
00:47:26,480 --> 00:47:28,520
Speaker 2: You know this is my piece? Okay.

857
00:47:28,880 --> 00:47:33,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, Another time, one hundred and sixty folks elected themselves

858
00:47:33,880 --> 00:47:36,920
Speaker 1: their own superintendent and then worked about one thousand acres

859
00:47:36,960 --> 00:47:40,440
Speaker 1: together and formed a joint stock company.

860
00:47:40,560 --> 00:47:40,840
Speaker 2: Wow.

861
00:47:40,880 --> 00:47:45,000
Speaker 1: And joint stock companies were a big part of this

862
00:47:45,160 --> 00:47:49,040
Speaker 1: black economic boom. The modern model of cooperative businesses were

863
00:47:49,080 --> 00:47:52,000
Speaker 1: developed in Europe years later, and then these were these

864
00:47:52,040 --> 00:47:54,840
Speaker 1: European practices were adopted by the black cooperative movement as

865
00:47:54,880 --> 00:47:57,920
Speaker 1: best as I can tell in the US. But they

866
00:47:57,960 --> 00:48:01,520
Speaker 1: started doing it anyway way before that, by using the

867
00:48:01,520 --> 00:48:03,959
Speaker 1: tools that were legally available to them, like the joint

868
00:48:03,960 --> 00:48:08,279
Speaker 1: stock company. And I wasn't able to figure out what

869
00:48:08,360 --> 00:48:10,719
Speaker 1: percentage of this was collectively managed. But I want to

870
00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:15,439
Speaker 1: talk about black landownership, Okay. By eighteen seventy five, three

871
00:48:15,480 --> 00:48:19,520
Speaker 1: million acres were owned by black farmers by nineteen hundred,

872
00:48:19,680 --> 00:48:23,880
Speaker 1: this was twelve million acres. Wow, the total. And this

873
00:48:23,960 --> 00:48:26,120
Speaker 1: is you're still only talking about like less than one

874
00:48:26,120 --> 00:48:28,160
Speaker 1: percent or something like that, maybe up to three percent.

875
00:48:28,160 --> 00:48:29,759
Speaker 1: I can't remember. I didn't write the percent numbers in

876
00:48:29,840 --> 00:48:34,480
Speaker 1: my script because I'm a fool. The landownership by black

877
00:48:34,520 --> 00:48:37,279
Speaker 1: people in the United States probably peaked in nineteen ten

878
00:48:37,600 --> 00:48:42,560
Speaker 1: at sixteen million acres across the US. These days, and

879
00:48:42,719 --> 00:48:45,399
Speaker 1: at least farmland, it is down to two point nine

880
00:48:45,400 --> 00:48:46,840
Speaker 1: million acres.

881
00:48:48,120 --> 00:48:48,480
Speaker 2: Wow.

882
00:48:49,160 --> 00:48:51,920
Speaker 1: There are groups like this is what I thought I

883
00:48:52,000 --> 00:48:53,680
Speaker 1: was going to be focusing on, because this is what

884
00:48:53,719 --> 00:48:56,560
Speaker 1: I knew about through some of my other work. There's

885
00:48:56,600 --> 00:48:59,240
Speaker 1: a group that was formed in the sixties, the nineteen

886
00:48:59,280 --> 00:49:03,600
Speaker 1: sixties that's called the Federation of Southern Cooperatives, and it

887
00:49:03,680 --> 00:49:08,960
Speaker 1: exists to fight to keep farmland and black cooperatively owned hands,

888
00:49:09,480 --> 00:49:13,000
Speaker 1: because that is an institution that people were fighting for

889
00:49:13,040 --> 00:49:15,799
Speaker 1: and defending because it had been around and then had

890
00:49:15,800 --> 00:49:18,240
Speaker 1: a spike in the sixties in the black cooperative movement,

891
00:49:18,360 --> 00:49:20,719
Speaker 1: which I know way less about, because again, that's what

892
00:49:20,800 --> 00:49:23,560
Speaker 1: I thought i'd be talking about today, but instead I'm

893
00:49:23,560 --> 00:49:25,080
Speaker 1: talking about one hundred years earlier.

894
00:49:25,480 --> 00:49:31,120
Speaker 2: Man, that's again, I just had no clue that any

895
00:49:31,160 --> 00:49:36,000
Speaker 2: of this was taking place. And it's also got to

896
00:49:36,000 --> 00:49:41,719
Speaker 2: be thinking like, man, I wish we could, I wish

897
00:49:41,880 --> 00:49:46,560
Speaker 2: documentation was better, but the organizing on plantations must have

898
00:49:46,560 --> 00:49:49,279
Speaker 2: just been like at the next level. Right to be

899
00:49:49,320 --> 00:49:53,200
Speaker 2: able to come out of slavery and immediately enact this

900
00:49:53,320 --> 00:49:57,560
Speaker 2: so that only a couple hundred people are affected, and

901
00:49:57,600 --> 00:49:59,400
Speaker 2: then on top of that, to find all of this

902
00:49:59,480 --> 00:50:03,080
Speaker 2: space or growth in land ownership and then continuing to

903
00:50:03,080 --> 00:50:06,359
Speaker 2: work to partnerships like that are not easy, you know,

904
00:50:06,480 --> 00:50:10,400
Speaker 2: like only land together and farming or do this equipment

905
00:50:10,520 --> 00:50:13,080
Speaker 2: we're sell it, And it's just like that's just so

906
00:50:13,200 --> 00:50:15,000
Speaker 2: much effort and work together. And the fact that they

907
00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:18,560
Speaker 2: were able to build the stuff up is blowing my

908
00:50:18,600 --> 00:50:19,399
Speaker 2: mind a little bit.

909
00:50:20,719 --> 00:50:23,359
Speaker 1: But you know, I mean they're all lazy and good

910
00:50:23,440 --> 00:50:24,000
Speaker 1: for nothing.

911
00:50:26,440 --> 00:50:29,000
Speaker 2: They didn't educate them, so they can't possibly know anything.

912
00:50:29,560 --> 00:50:33,720
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, exactly, like instead of like absolutely white socialists

913
00:50:33,719 --> 00:50:36,400
Speaker 1: should have been looking over their shoulders earlier. Yeah, you know,

914
00:50:37,880 --> 00:50:40,960
Speaker 1: black farmers also banded together to coordinate how to resist

915
00:50:40,960 --> 00:50:44,920
Speaker 1: being forced to sell everything cheap, and they coordinated their

916
00:50:44,960 --> 00:50:48,280
Speaker 1: market power between small farmers and they did this coordination

917
00:50:48,400 --> 00:50:50,879
Speaker 1: through Black churches, and this pissed off the racists, who

918
00:50:50,880 --> 00:50:56,160
Speaker 1: then you know, would attack churches and whatever. And I've

919
00:50:56,239 --> 00:50:58,920
Speaker 1: covered a lot about the did a whole bunch of

920
00:50:58,920 --> 00:51:02,400
Speaker 1: episodes about KKK. The newly free black people in America

921
00:51:03,320 --> 00:51:06,800
Speaker 1: were really poised to take America in a radically new direction,

922
00:51:06,880 --> 00:51:09,640
Speaker 1: the direction of cooperation, because among them there was, to

923
00:51:09,680 --> 00:51:13,640
Speaker 1: quote du Bois again, quote little of that great inequality

924
00:51:13,640 --> 00:51:17,480
Speaker 1: of wealth distribution which marks modern life, and that quote

925
00:51:17,840 --> 00:51:22,319
Speaker 1: nearly all of their economic effort tends towards true economic cooperation.

926
00:51:23,480 --> 00:51:26,440
Speaker 1: And just as folks are starting to try and sort

927
00:51:26,440 --> 00:51:28,839
Speaker 1: this out, as black people are getting their fucking shit

928
00:51:28,880 --> 00:51:32,080
Speaker 1: together during reconstruction, du Bois puts it out that black

929
00:51:32,080 --> 00:51:36,000
Speaker 1: people quote emerged to a semblance of economic freedom, only

930
00:51:36,040 --> 00:51:38,760
Speaker 1: to be met by the Black Codes and political revolution.

931
00:51:40,520 --> 00:51:43,239
Speaker 1: The Black Codes are various laws that going back to

932
00:51:43,280 --> 00:51:46,280
Speaker 1: colonial America, restrict the rights of even free black people,

933
00:51:46,840 --> 00:51:50,840
Speaker 1: laws preventing owning property, or gathering for warship, or owning guns.

934
00:51:50,960 --> 00:51:53,640
Speaker 1: People love to forget about that part. All the first

935
00:51:53,680 --> 00:51:57,439
Speaker 1: fucking gun laws in the US step prevent black people

936
00:51:57,440 --> 00:52:00,200
Speaker 1: from voting or even reading and writing. Even frapp free

937
00:52:00,200 --> 00:52:03,600
Speaker 1: Black people were often prevented from legally being allowed to

938
00:52:03,640 --> 00:52:06,560
Speaker 1: be literate, all different in different places at different times.

939
00:52:07,840 --> 00:52:10,960
Speaker 1: Even the Northern States had the Black Codes, sometimes specifically

940
00:52:11,040 --> 00:52:13,160
Speaker 1: to try and convince black people to go live elsewhere,

941
00:52:13,239 --> 00:52:16,399
Speaker 1: because like a lot of like like New York had

942
00:52:16,400 --> 00:52:18,080
Speaker 1: this had a bunch of black code laws, and it

943
00:52:18,080 --> 00:52:19,920
Speaker 1: was like specifically being lang, well, we don't want you here,

944
00:52:19,960 --> 00:52:22,520
Speaker 1: and we're not going to like enslave you, but we

945
00:52:22,520 --> 00:52:23,880
Speaker 1: don't want you around the police.

946
00:52:23,880 --> 00:52:27,000
Speaker 2: Don't come here. Yeah, maybe free, but somewhere else.

947
00:52:27,560 --> 00:52:31,239
Speaker 1: Yeah. Most Northern states seem to have abolish the Black

948
00:52:31,239 --> 00:52:33,920
Speaker 1: codes after the Civil War, obviously all kinds of new

949
00:52:33,920 --> 00:52:36,359
Speaker 1: shit like redlining and stuff kicking right away. Don't get

950
00:52:36,400 --> 00:52:39,960
Speaker 1: me wrong. Of course, after the Civil War, though, these

951
00:52:40,000 --> 00:52:43,359
Speaker 1: codes exploded across the South, specifically so that Democrats could

952
00:52:43,400 --> 00:52:46,040
Speaker 1: hold on to power now that a huge chunk of

953
00:52:46,080 --> 00:52:48,880
Speaker 1: their population could suddenly vote. That was a huge part

954
00:52:48,920 --> 00:52:51,320
Speaker 1: of why the South was like, fuck, if we free,

955
00:52:51,760 --> 00:52:57,520
Speaker 1: they're going to vote us out. You know. Meanwhile, as

956
00:52:57,560 --> 00:53:00,160
Speaker 1: black people emigrated away from the South to get away

957
00:53:00,200 --> 00:53:03,000
Speaker 1: from you know, their former owners and Black codes and

958
00:53:03,000 --> 00:53:06,239
Speaker 1: the KKK and really any reason they wanted, they could

959
00:53:06,280 --> 00:53:11,120
Speaker 1: leave for because they're bored. I'll away from Yeah. Relief

960
00:53:11,239 --> 00:53:14,240
Speaker 1: societies were set up to help people move into new cities,

961
00:53:14,760 --> 00:53:18,440
Speaker 1: including just as the examples that I ran across Indianapolis

962
00:53:18,440 --> 00:53:23,480
Speaker 1: and Saint Louis. Also in Kansas, sixty thousand black refugees

963
00:53:23,480 --> 00:53:26,719
Speaker 1: from the South were helped by these societies. The financial

964
00:53:26,719 --> 00:53:30,400
Speaker 1: help wasn't a lot. That society raised sixty eight thousand dollars,

965
00:53:30,760 --> 00:53:34,280
Speaker 1: so it's like it's almost it's a dollar a person roughly,

966
00:53:35,200 --> 00:53:39,759
Speaker 1: but that ain't nothing, especially when you spend it cooperatively, right,

967
00:53:39,880 --> 00:53:42,359
Speaker 1: because a lot of the stuff that they're doing is

968
00:53:42,400 --> 00:53:46,399
Speaker 1: like pulling their money to buy food in bulk and

969
00:53:46,440 --> 00:53:51,080
Speaker 1: like finding ways to live cheaper. You know. Anyway, in

970
00:53:51,120 --> 00:53:54,440
Speaker 1: Tennessee you have the ex Slave Mutual Relief, Bounty and

971
00:53:54,480 --> 00:53:57,319
Speaker 1: Pension Association, And this one was around for a long

972
00:53:57,360 --> 00:54:01,839
Speaker 1: ass time, well into the twentieth century. OHO it existed

973
00:54:02,440 --> 00:54:05,840
Speaker 1: to lobby to get formally enslaved people pensions for the

974
00:54:05,880 --> 00:54:12,480
Speaker 1: work that they'd already done, which famously was unpaid. And

975
00:54:13,960 --> 00:54:16,920
Speaker 1: there's a million reasons to be mad about slavery, but

976
00:54:16,960 --> 00:54:19,400
Speaker 1: one of them is just like whenever you read the

977
00:54:19,480 --> 00:54:22,359
Speaker 1: nuts and bolts of abolitionist movements, and shit, so many

978
00:54:22,360 --> 00:54:24,640
Speaker 1: of the Protestant fucking slave owners and some of the

979
00:54:24,640 --> 00:54:27,760
Speaker 1: white abolitionists are like, well, we need to teach people

980
00:54:27,760 --> 00:54:30,600
Speaker 1: the importance of hard work and of paying off their debts.

981
00:54:30,920 --> 00:54:34,120
Speaker 1: So once we buy them their freedom, their former owners

982
00:54:34,120 --> 00:54:37,560
Speaker 1: can be properly compensated, and then that person owes us

983
00:54:37,600 --> 00:54:39,759
Speaker 1: the cost of freeing them, like.

984
00:54:39,920 --> 00:54:44,399
Speaker 2: Woo the mental gymnastics. I know. Like it's multiple things.

985
00:54:44,440 --> 00:54:47,600
Speaker 2: One is, yes, we freed you, but we were right

986
00:54:47,600 --> 00:54:50,560
Speaker 2: to enslave you in the first place. Yeah, we're right

987
00:54:50,600 --> 00:54:53,200
Speaker 2: to do it. And now that you're free, you owe

988
00:54:53,239 --> 00:54:55,560
Speaker 2: us money. That's a crazy fucking thing to say to

989
00:54:55,600 --> 00:54:59,400
Speaker 2: a person. I hope people got slap silly, I know.

990
00:55:00,760 --> 00:55:04,560
Speaker 2: And the other idea of like, I don't know, just

991
00:55:04,600 --> 00:55:11,600
Speaker 2: this this feeling of you must punish yourself into success. Right,

992
00:55:11,640 --> 00:55:16,840
Speaker 2: if you're not born wealthy, then you owe this society

993
00:55:16,920 --> 00:55:20,040
Speaker 2: or this culture something, and we need to know that

994
00:55:20,120 --> 00:55:22,640
Speaker 2: it hurt you and that it was very difficult for

995
00:55:22,680 --> 00:55:25,080
Speaker 2: you or were unhappy if you obtain any kind of

996
00:55:25,600 --> 00:55:28,760
Speaker 2: level of comfort or happiness, like our society is weird.

997
00:55:30,000 --> 00:55:34,560
Speaker 1: No, no, that that's a really good point. And I

998
00:55:34,640 --> 00:55:37,600
Speaker 1: just I think about to say that the person who

999
00:55:37,719 --> 00:55:40,879
Speaker 1: is property owes money to the person that they did

1000
00:55:41,000 --> 00:55:45,080
Speaker 1: unpaid labor for to compensate for the property that was lost.

1001
00:55:45,440 --> 00:55:48,160
Speaker 1: And what it says, it says an awful lot about

1002
00:55:48,160 --> 00:55:52,719
Speaker 1: capitalism because people talk about capitalism like it's and I

1003
00:55:52,719 --> 00:55:55,120
Speaker 1: think this is because capitalism has presented itself this way,

1004
00:55:55,560 --> 00:55:58,080
Speaker 1: where it's the economy where people work for money and

1005
00:55:58,080 --> 00:56:00,759
Speaker 1: then spend that money. That is not capitalism. That's just

1006
00:56:00,800 --> 00:56:04,759
Speaker 1: market economies, which is a much broader category. Capitalism is

1007
00:56:04,760 --> 00:56:09,000
Speaker 1: when capital the stuff and people that you own, is

1008
00:56:09,040 --> 00:56:13,000
Speaker 1: the primary thing that is utilized to generate wealth. Capitalism

1009
00:56:13,040 --> 00:56:15,960
Speaker 1: is literally other people working so that you can make

1010
00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:19,399
Speaker 1: a living off of them. And this was true most

1011
00:56:19,440 --> 00:56:23,040
Speaker 1: explicitly under slavery, but it's also true under what folks

1012
00:56:23,080 --> 00:56:25,120
Speaker 1: at the time. I'm not saying we should bring back

1013
00:56:25,120 --> 00:56:29,200
Speaker 1: the phrase wage slavery, but it is how socialist at

1014
00:56:29,200 --> 00:56:31,480
Speaker 1: the time, and a lot of free black people, at

1015
00:56:31,560 --> 00:56:34,400
Speaker 1: least several that I read, I don't know. I cannot

1016
00:56:34,440 --> 00:56:37,279
Speaker 1: tell you how the average newly freed person felt about

1017
00:56:37,280 --> 00:56:39,719
Speaker 1: the phrase wage slavery, but a lot of them used

1018
00:56:39,760 --> 00:56:45,040
Speaker 1: it to say, like, you're still working for someone else's

1019
00:56:45,120 --> 00:56:47,760
Speaker 1: you're making money for someone else. That is your new job.

1020
00:56:49,360 --> 00:56:52,640
Speaker 1: Way better than chattel slavery. And I'm not advocating we

1021
00:56:52,680 --> 00:56:55,759
Speaker 1: bring back wage slavery as a way of describing capitalism.

1022
00:56:55,480 --> 00:56:59,839
Speaker 2: But your point is heard and well taken. And i mean,

1023
00:57:00,960 --> 00:57:03,560
Speaker 2: look at the hoops they went through to be like, oh,

1024
00:57:03,600 --> 00:57:05,040
Speaker 2: service jobs, you don't have to pay those people. I

1025
00:57:05,040 --> 00:57:11,640
Speaker 2: don't even worry about that. Yeah, yeah, they play games.

1026
00:57:11,880 --> 00:57:14,000
Speaker 2: I think it's it's just very exhausting when you look

1027
00:57:14,080 --> 00:57:18,800
Speaker 2: back at fights for freedom and typically what you see

1028
00:57:18,800 --> 00:57:22,440
Speaker 2: are like these swift gains and then an immediate hammer

1029
00:57:22,520 --> 00:57:27,400
Speaker 2: of like, no, this progress terrifying to us, slow it down.

1030
00:57:27,440 --> 00:57:31,400
Speaker 2: It's like we should be fighting forever. It's so exhausting.

1031
00:57:32,000 --> 00:57:37,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, the forces of reaction are a fuck like. And

1032
00:57:37,280 --> 00:57:40,800
Speaker 1: it's interesting too, is like this is a little bit

1033
00:57:40,840 --> 00:57:44,040
Speaker 1: my conjecture, But everything I've read about all this stuff,

1034
00:57:44,560 --> 00:57:47,960
Speaker 1: it's like the abolitionists. Part of the reason that they

1035
00:57:48,000 --> 00:57:50,920
Speaker 1: were like, oh, well, buy everyone's freedom, will gradually get

1036
00:57:51,000 --> 00:57:52,880
Speaker 1: rid of slavery. They thought it was the only way

1037
00:57:52,880 --> 00:57:54,760
Speaker 1: that they could get Some of them were like just

1038
00:57:54,960 --> 00:57:57,560
Speaker 1: weird Protestant work ethic motherfuckers, but a lot of them

1039
00:57:57,560 --> 00:57:58,800
Speaker 1: were like, well, this is the only way we can

1040
00:57:58,840 --> 00:58:01,760
Speaker 1: come up with to free the slaves. Now, a lot

1041
00:58:01,800 --> 00:58:02,960
Speaker 1: of people were like, well, I can come up with

1042
00:58:02,960 --> 00:58:04,720
Speaker 1: another way. And they look over at Haiti and they're like,

1043
00:58:04,720 --> 00:58:05,880
Speaker 1: what if we get a bunch of guns and we

1044
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:07,760
Speaker 1: shoot all the slave owners so we don't have any

1045
00:58:07,760 --> 00:58:12,240
Speaker 1: slave owners anymore. And what's funny is the South, they

1046
00:58:12,280 --> 00:58:15,439
Speaker 1: could have taken the like the plantation owners and shit,

1047
00:58:16,400 --> 00:58:19,440
Speaker 1: could have stayed rich as fuck and been paid for

1048
00:58:21,200 --> 00:58:24,720
Speaker 1: to free all the people. That was an offer that

1049
00:58:24,800 --> 00:58:28,280
Speaker 1: was on the table repeatedly, you know, and they were like, no, fuck,

1050
00:58:28,320 --> 00:58:30,920
Speaker 1: you were holding onto slavery. And so finally eventually people

1051
00:58:30,920 --> 00:58:34,160
Speaker 1: were like, all right, what if we shoot you all?

1052
00:58:34,800 --> 00:58:37,640
Speaker 2: We have to get pilot again. You're not listening. And

1053
00:58:37,680 --> 00:58:43,360
Speaker 2: it's interesting as we talk about capitalism and backlash now,

1054
00:58:43,440 --> 00:58:47,560
Speaker 2: like I been thinking a lot. I was a film

1055
00:58:47,600 --> 00:58:51,720
Speaker 2: and television critic before I started producing, and there was

1056
00:58:51,800 --> 00:58:55,720
Speaker 2: this surge like like Trump comes to office, right, and

1057
00:58:55,760 --> 00:58:57,880
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, people are like, well, we need women,

1058
00:58:57,920 --> 00:58:59,720
Speaker 2: and we need people of color, and we need them

1059
00:58:59,800 --> 00:59:03,320
Speaker 2: visit put them in front. And then I think behind

1060
00:59:03,360 --> 00:59:08,520
Speaker 2: that in a smaller but but vocal move, it was

1061
00:59:08,560 --> 00:59:12,000
Speaker 2: like okay, well, also like center trans people like let's

1062
00:59:12,320 --> 00:59:14,280
Speaker 2: every like do everybody get out there and like be

1063
00:59:14,440 --> 00:59:18,680
Speaker 2: in front. And it's been interesting in the past two

1064
00:59:18,760 --> 00:59:24,080
Speaker 2: years post pandemic, we're seeing all of these offers being

1065
00:59:24,080 --> 00:59:26,320
Speaker 2: taken off the table, Like I think if you're looking

1066
00:59:26,400 --> 00:59:33,240
Speaker 2: at your queer, trans, black, Indigenous, uh Latine Asian folks

1067
00:59:33,280 --> 00:59:38,680
Speaker 2: who were influencers specifically, like that's just an area I

1068
00:59:38,720 --> 00:59:43,840
Speaker 2: know well who were getting brand deals and writing opportunities

1069
00:59:43,880 --> 00:59:47,000
Speaker 2: and performance opportunities left right and center, especially as whatever

1070
00:59:47,080 --> 00:59:49,560
Speaker 2: months you fall under was coming up all of a sudden,

1071
00:59:49,560 --> 00:59:51,240
Speaker 2: it's like, wow, my inbox is school and at least

1072
00:59:51,240 --> 00:59:54,240
Speaker 2: I'll get paid really well in this month to talk

1073
00:59:54,280 --> 00:59:58,840
Speaker 2: about how this country is okay, cool, whatever. They're disappearing

1074
00:59:59,000 --> 01:00:01,440
Speaker 2: and then we're seeing it too and the number of

1075
01:00:01,560 --> 01:00:04,760
Speaker 2: queer shows that were canceled in the past year and

1076
01:00:04,840 --> 01:00:08,600
Speaker 2: a half, and then they're like a crazy lack of

1077
01:00:08,920 --> 01:00:12,400
Speaker 2: diversity just across the board the way these things come

1078
01:00:12,560 --> 01:00:16,200
Speaker 2: in ways, and you have to so brace yourself, particularly

1079
01:00:16,200 --> 01:00:18,800
Speaker 2: if you want to be a creative living in these spaces,

1080
01:00:18,840 --> 01:00:21,560
Speaker 2: to just be like, well, I guess these next ten years,

1081
01:00:22,320 --> 01:00:25,280
Speaker 2: the years just don't matter, and we'll go around to

1082
01:00:25,320 --> 01:00:30,120
Speaker 2: make indie art. Yeah, totally, totally, like a Harry Belafonte

1083
01:00:30,560 --> 01:00:34,680
Speaker 2: in his career super high up during World War two era,

1084
01:00:34,920 --> 01:00:37,880
Speaker 2: like he flying high, make a lot of deals. Uh,

1085
01:00:38,720 --> 01:00:41,920
Speaker 2: we're getting close into like wartime. He's anti war. No

1086
01:00:41,960 --> 01:00:43,520
Speaker 2: one touches you, we don't want to talk to you,

1087
01:00:43,560 --> 01:00:45,480
Speaker 2: don't look at us, get out of here, da da da.

1088
01:00:46,200 --> 01:00:48,560
Speaker 2: And it's usually not until much later when these people

1089
01:00:48,560 --> 01:00:50,320
Speaker 2: are legends that were like, oh wow, they stood in

1090
01:00:50,320 --> 01:00:53,320
Speaker 2: their truth. How cool was that? And just like I

1091
01:00:53,320 --> 01:00:57,040
Speaker 2: don't know the way Cable's just destroys in so many ways,

1092
01:00:57,080 --> 01:01:02,160
Speaker 2: but particularly creatively. It's a man would love to not

1093
01:01:02,200 --> 01:01:04,040
Speaker 2: live in this system.

1094
01:01:03,680 --> 01:01:06,720
Speaker 1: I know. And the one thing that kind of gives

1095
01:01:06,760 --> 01:01:10,840
Speaker 1: me hope is that like twenty years ago, like I

1096
01:01:10,880 --> 01:01:14,080
Speaker 1: when I was talking about being anti capitalist, people did

1097
01:01:14,120 --> 01:01:16,520
Speaker 1: not know what to make of that, you know, And

1098
01:01:16,520 --> 01:01:19,000
Speaker 1: I feel like enough time has passed that like the

1099
01:01:19,080 --> 01:01:22,200
Speaker 1: shadow of like Cold War propaganda has like receded where

1100
01:01:22,240 --> 01:01:24,680
Speaker 1: people can be like, oh, you mean there's other forms

1101
01:01:24,680 --> 01:01:27,479
Speaker 1: of socialism and communism and like ways of being other

1102
01:01:27,560 --> 01:01:31,200
Speaker 1: than become the USSR. And you're like, yes, that's what

1103
01:01:31,200 --> 01:01:33,800
Speaker 1: we've been trying to tell you all along and like

1104
01:01:35,440 --> 01:01:40,120
Speaker 1: it's cool, it's it's but yeah, no, it's this. But

1105
01:01:40,240 --> 01:01:43,880
Speaker 1: we're currently seeing the backlash, we're currently seeing a rise

1106
01:01:44,040 --> 01:01:49,080
Speaker 1: in fascism, and anyway, it's not a current events show.

1107
01:01:49,120 --> 01:01:52,600
Speaker 1: But to finish out that organization, the one fighting for

1108
01:01:52,680 --> 01:01:57,320
Speaker 1: pensions in Tennessee, Yes, they did that fight for decades.

1109
01:01:57,360 --> 01:02:00,000
Speaker 1: They fought for twenty years for pensions. They finally gave

1110
01:02:00,160 --> 01:02:04,600
Speaker 1: up in nineteen sixteen, I think probably because d well

1111
01:02:05,040 --> 01:02:08,360
Speaker 1: most of the formerly enslaved people were dying by that point.

1112
01:02:08,680 --> 01:02:12,760
Speaker 1: You know. They did, however, keep going for another fifteen

1113
01:02:12,840 --> 01:02:17,400
Speaker 1: years as one of these mutual aid societies, and until

1114
01:02:17,640 --> 01:02:22,920
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty one, I think black unionism picked up. It

1115
01:02:23,000 --> 01:02:24,880
Speaker 1: was built less out of the white labor movement and

1116
01:02:24,960 --> 01:02:27,520
Speaker 1: more out of these white mutual aid societies. Is the

1117
01:02:27,560 --> 01:02:31,560
Speaker 1: best that I can tell until you start getting industrial

1118
01:02:31,680 --> 01:02:34,160
Speaker 1: unionism and the early aughts where you start having these

1119
01:02:34,200 --> 01:02:38,640
Speaker 1: like consciously multi racial union I'm just talking about the

1120
01:02:38,640 --> 01:02:40,680
Speaker 1: industrial Workers of the World again, my favorite union from

1121
01:02:40,680 --> 01:02:49,400
Speaker 1: back then consciously organizing black doc workers in Philly, Mexican

1122
01:02:49,480 --> 01:02:53,360
Speaker 1: miners in the Southwest, Japanese immigrants in the Pacific Northwest,

1123
01:02:53,440 --> 01:02:58,400
Speaker 1: European immigrants all together in one union. And because it

1124
01:02:58,440 --> 01:03:00,520
Speaker 1: was a horizontal union, it wasn't like white people at

1125
01:03:00,560 --> 01:03:03,440
Speaker 1: the top telling everyone what to do. You know, so

1126
01:03:03,520 --> 01:03:06,160
Speaker 1: until that point, until you start getting like the multiracial

1127
01:03:06,640 --> 01:03:10,200
Speaker 1: union organizing, and there were other multiracial union organized I

1128
01:03:10,200 --> 01:03:12,600
Speaker 1: am now completely out of my wheelhouse of stuff I know, well,

1129
01:03:12,640 --> 01:03:14,320
Speaker 1: only stuff I know the cliffs notes of. And that's

1130
01:03:14,360 --> 01:03:16,680
Speaker 1: not what this show is that Margaret knows the cliff notes.

1131
01:03:16,800 --> 01:03:18,680
Speaker 1: It's Margaret takes some things she knows the cliff notes

1132
01:03:18,720 --> 01:03:21,400
Speaker 1: about and then reads like eight books I'm exaggerating, reads

1133
01:03:21,400 --> 01:03:26,080
Speaker 1: two books about them and twelve articles or whatever. Anyway,

1134
01:03:27,120 --> 01:03:30,040
Speaker 1: one of these days we'll talk about cooperative workplaces themselves

1135
01:03:30,560 --> 01:03:32,400
Speaker 1: that grew the ones that grew out of these efforts,

1136
01:03:32,480 --> 01:03:36,320
Speaker 1: and how they tied into and informed broader cooperative movements worldwide.

1137
01:03:37,080 --> 01:03:39,560
Speaker 1: But that's a story for another day, because it turns

1138
01:03:39,560 --> 01:03:44,520
Speaker 1: out the roots go really, really deep, and I like

1139
01:03:44,600 --> 01:03:49,000
Speaker 1: the roots of stories. I like root vegetables, like potatoes.

1140
01:03:48,920 --> 01:03:53,960
Speaker 2: They're delicious. That's and oh man, that was great. I

1141
01:03:54,000 --> 01:03:57,360
Speaker 2: can't wait to learn more about like what progresses out

1142
01:03:57,400 --> 01:04:01,560
Speaker 2: of these movements, and again, like bless you for the

1143
01:04:01,560 --> 01:04:05,040
Speaker 2: work you do like all this, Like you know, some

1144
01:04:05,080 --> 01:04:07,520
Speaker 2: of this history is hidden, some of it it just

1145
01:04:07,560 --> 01:04:10,720
Speaker 2: hasn't been covered as well as others. But it's it's

1146
01:04:10,880 --> 01:04:13,360
Speaker 2: refreshing to come here and learn so much about my history.

1147
01:04:13,360 --> 01:04:14,200
Speaker 2: I really like it.

1148
01:04:14,360 --> 01:04:18,320
Speaker 1: Thanks. I feel very self conscious that I'm like, hey,

1149
01:04:18,480 --> 01:04:21,120
Speaker 1: let me tell you about some black history. But I

1150
01:04:21,200 --> 01:04:24,320
Speaker 1: like would feel a lot worse not I talk about

1151
01:04:24,400 --> 01:04:26,240
Speaker 1: radical history. If you're talking about radical history in the

1152
01:04:26,360 --> 01:04:27,240
Speaker 1: United States.

1153
01:04:27,080 --> 01:04:29,000
Speaker 2: You gotta talk about black history in the United States.

1154
01:04:29,000 --> 01:04:31,800
Speaker 2: They go hand in hand. It's totally fine. I love it.

1155
01:04:32,240 --> 01:04:36,080
Speaker 1: Cool. Well you had anything you want to plug here?

1156
01:04:37,080 --> 01:04:42,200
Speaker 2: Uh no, not really? Come come see me on the

1157
01:04:42,280 --> 01:04:45,760
Speaker 2: instagrams if that's a thing that you do. I like.

1158
01:04:46,120 --> 01:04:47,920
Speaker 2: I like the stories feature. I don't know how much

1159
01:04:47,920 --> 01:04:54,200
Speaker 2: longer I'll be there is just Joelle Underscore Monique over

1160
01:04:54,240 --> 01:04:55,040
Speaker 2: on Instagram.

1161
01:04:55,520 --> 01:04:57,360
Speaker 1: I was recently, I was I was talking to someone

1162
01:04:57,400 --> 01:04:59,320
Speaker 1: and I was like, I used to define success as

1163
01:04:59,320 --> 01:05:02,240
Speaker 1: the ability to eat food based on my creative work,

1164
01:05:02,280 --> 01:05:05,080
Speaker 1: and by that I am successful. Actually have been for

1165
01:05:05,720 --> 01:05:07,760
Speaker 1: a while because I used to live off of like nothing,

1166
01:05:07,880 --> 01:05:09,920
Speaker 1: so it was easier for me to do so. I

1167
01:05:09,920 --> 01:05:13,120
Speaker 1: lived in the cabin in the woods. But I've decided

1168
01:05:13,120 --> 01:05:15,400
Speaker 1: recently my new standard of success. The next level I

1169
01:05:15,440 --> 01:05:18,960
Speaker 1: want to reach is where I can just delete my

1170
01:05:19,040 --> 01:05:21,200
Speaker 1: social media and not think that it's going to impact

1171
01:05:21,200 --> 01:05:22,320
Speaker 1: my ability to eat food.

1172
01:05:22,800 --> 01:05:27,000
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, what a joy it would be not

1173
01:05:27,040 --> 01:05:30,000
Speaker 2: to be chained to these things. I'm almost have Twitter

1174
01:05:30,000 --> 01:05:33,320
Speaker 2: out of my systems. I had a good Girls swoop

1175
01:05:33,400 --> 01:05:35,800
Speaker 2: chat on there that was dragging me back a lot.

1176
01:05:37,160 --> 01:05:39,760
Speaker 2: I have time limits set up on my social so

1177
01:05:39,840 --> 01:05:42,320
Speaker 2: I am not too I never hit a time limit

1178
01:05:42,360 --> 01:05:43,800
Speaker 2: on Twitter anymore. So I was like, Okay, that's a

1179
01:05:43,840 --> 01:05:46,320
Speaker 2: really weird nice We're steps away from being able to

1180
01:05:46,440 --> 01:05:49,040
Speaker 2: leat and move on. But now, of course. And I

1181
01:05:49,040 --> 01:05:50,959
Speaker 2: never signed on for TikTok, so I didn't get caught

1182
01:05:51,000 --> 01:05:55,960
Speaker 2: into the algorithm chap, thank god. But man, Instagram, all

1183
01:05:55,960 --> 01:05:57,960
Speaker 2: my friends are there? What are we doing? What's happening

1184
01:05:58,440 --> 01:06:01,320
Speaker 2: to go for lunch? Is it tasty?

1185
01:06:01,560 --> 01:06:04,960
Speaker 1: Well? See what I think I might do eventually. I mean,

1186
01:06:05,000 --> 01:06:06,360
Speaker 1: I guess a lot of people do this where they

1187
01:06:06,400 --> 01:06:10,720
Speaker 1: have like a personal Instagram, and I don't know, I

1188
01:06:10,760 --> 01:06:11,640
Speaker 1: don't know any slang.

1189
01:06:11,680 --> 01:06:13,720
Speaker 2: The Instagram is the fake one, and then you have.

1190
01:06:13,720 --> 01:06:18,240
Speaker 1: The okay and so thank you. I like think about

1191
01:06:18,280 --> 01:06:20,240
Speaker 1: having one that's just like, actually, I can use it

1192
01:06:20,320 --> 01:06:22,959
Speaker 1: like a normal person instead of like everything I do

1193
01:06:23,080 --> 01:06:26,360
Speaker 1: has to be thought about as realise of these things.

1194
01:06:26,360 --> 01:06:29,360
Speaker 1: And I think about how I'm like, I would like

1195
01:06:29,400 --> 01:06:31,240
Speaker 1: to keep Instagram, and I would like to delete Twitter

1196
01:06:31,240 --> 01:06:33,800
Speaker 1: because Twitter is just a nightmare discourse machine that makes

1197
01:06:33,800 --> 01:06:37,920
Speaker 1: everyone hate each other. But I'm about to release a novel.

1198
01:06:37,920 --> 01:06:39,560
Speaker 1: This is my segue into my plug. I'm very good

1199
01:06:39,560 --> 01:06:41,680
Speaker 1: at MYLF, but I'm about to release a novel. And

1200
01:06:41,720 --> 01:06:44,760
Speaker 1: I thought to myself, like, I can't delete my largest

1201
01:06:44,800 --> 01:06:51,480
Speaker 1: platform before I released this book. But what book, you

1202
01:06:51,560 --> 01:06:53,400
Speaker 1: might ask. No one's asking me that I've been talking

1203
01:06:53,400 --> 01:06:54,880
Speaker 1: about at the end of every episode, but I'm still

1204
01:06:54,920 --> 01:06:57,680
Speaker 1: going to read another blurb for it. The Sapling Cage

1205
01:06:57,680 --> 01:07:01,360
Speaker 1: is kickstarting now and it Wow, it's doing great or

1206
01:07:01,600 --> 01:07:03,280
Speaker 1: I don't know how it's doing. I'm recording this before

1207
01:07:03,320 --> 01:07:07,000
Speaker 1: the kids the kid starter goes life, but I hope

1208
01:07:07,000 --> 01:07:09,960
Speaker 1: it's doing great or I'd probably say that no matter

1209
01:07:10,000 --> 01:07:13,160
Speaker 1: what it looks like, honestly, because oh god, fuck my life.

1210
01:07:13,360 --> 01:07:18,000
Speaker 2: Any manifesting greatness, Margaret, It's amazing, it's doing well, gangbusters.

1211
01:07:17,400 --> 01:07:22,360
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, So what the author Nino sepri

1212
01:07:22,560 --> 01:07:26,919
Speaker 1: Offer of Finna had to say is The Sapling Cage

1213
01:07:26,960 --> 01:07:31,240
Speaker 1: is a compelling coming of age fantasy with impeccable vibes. Witches, knights,

1214
01:07:31,360 --> 01:07:34,240
Speaker 1: errant and monsters populate a rich story about a trans

1215
01:07:34,240 --> 01:07:37,760
Speaker 1: girl finding power and community. It's also a reminder that

1216
01:07:37,840 --> 01:07:42,560
Speaker 1: fantasy can be a vehicle for so much interrogations of power, knowledge, ethics,

1217
01:07:42,840 --> 01:07:44,919
Speaker 1: and an exploration of how to live in the world.

1218
01:07:46,640 --> 01:07:49,520
Speaker 2: Hey, that's a good one too. I like that one.

1219
01:07:50,320 --> 01:07:52,920
Speaker 2: The first one was all like, oh, I should pagin

1220
01:07:53,040 --> 01:07:55,560
Speaker 2: it's big emotion. This one's like so compelling. Girls, you

1221
01:07:55,640 --> 01:07:57,080
Speaker 2: can be sitting and thinking about this one for a

1222
01:07:57,200 --> 01:07:57,800
Speaker 2: long time.

1223
01:08:00,760 --> 01:08:03,400
Speaker 1: I hope so. And I'm really excited that people seem

1224
01:08:03,400 --> 01:08:04,880
Speaker 1: to be enjoying it, the people who have gone to

1225
01:08:04,880 --> 01:08:07,360
Speaker 1: read it so far. And you, dear listener, can enjoy

1226
01:08:07,400 --> 01:08:11,600
Speaker 1: it by going to Kickstarter and backing it, or waiting

1227
01:08:11,640 --> 01:08:13,880
Speaker 1: until it comes to a library and getting it from

1228
01:08:13,920 --> 01:08:16,519
Speaker 1: the library. But you can put in library request forms,

1229
01:08:16,880 --> 01:08:20,920
Speaker 1: or you can go to a chain bookstore and never mind,

1230
01:08:21,320 --> 01:08:24,439
Speaker 1: you can imagine what steal it. It's a joke about

1231
01:08:24,439 --> 01:08:26,200
Speaker 1: stealing it. I don't care if you steal my book

1232
01:08:26,200 --> 01:08:29,679
Speaker 1: from a chain bookstore. That's what I'm flirting around. Anyway,

1233
01:08:30,400 --> 01:08:39,400
Speaker 1: I will see all of you next week. Cool People

1234
01:08:39,439 --> 01:08:42,240
Speaker 1: Who Did Cool Stuff is a production of cool Zone Media.

1235
01:08:42,560 --> 01:08:45,439
Speaker 1: For more podcasts and cool Zone Media, visit our website

1236
01:08:45,520 --> 01:08:49,200
Speaker 1: Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,

1237
01:08:49,240 --> 01:08:52,479
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.