Speaker 1: They used to these hardy boy missing books. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I always thought the Hardy Boys like tuning this from Detroit,
Speaker 1: like I like, I was surprised when I started going
Speaker 1: to Rick School. Right, this is not that The Hardy
Speaker 1: Boys is just James and Dreills solving mysteries, racist money stuff.
Speaker 1: You can't tell me. Yep, there it is there, it
Speaker 1: is there. It is. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another
Speaker 1: phenomenal episode of My Mama Told Me the podcast. But
Speaker 1: we died deep, deep into the pockets of black inspiras theories,
Speaker 1: and we worked to finally prove that Montell Williams is
Speaker 1: planning to murder the second husband and restore his relationship
Speaker 1: with Kamala Harris. That's right. He is gonna seek his vengeance.
Speaker 1: He lost the good one, Ladies and gentlemen. He's gonna
Speaker 1: stand outside of Kamala's house holding up a boom box
Speaker 1: playing uh Mrs Officer by But Bobby Valentino will will
Speaker 1: we will will we like a cock car. He's gonna
Speaker 1: get her back. I'm your host, likes think Erman. I'm
Speaker 1: happy to be here. As always, I have been reading
Speaker 1: through some of the wonderful notes that people have been
Speaker 1: sending us over about the podcast, and so many kind words,
Speaker 1: a lot of people saying very sweet things, and a
Speaker 1: few people correcting some of the stupid things that I say.
Speaker 1: One of which I'd love to read to you all
Speaker 1: today a message that came from a gentleman named Corey Stewart.
Speaker 1: I think it's a gentleman. It could be a lady.
Speaker 1: I don't know and don't matter, but Corey sent us
Speaker 1: that basically, uh, in reference to me Paul is dead
Speaker 1: theory that we discussed where Paul McCartney was said to
Speaker 1: have died in a car crash and and uh no
Speaker 1: longer was actually Paul McCartney, but was being played by
Speaker 1: a different person. Uh. He said, you're correct about Paul
Speaker 1: being interpreted as dead because he's shoeless. But there's more.
Speaker 1: This is good stuff. I didn't get to my dad.
Speaker 1: A boomer Beatles fanatic explained the theory to me. This
Speaker 1: first in line is John Lynne. He's in an all
Speaker 1: white suit, has long hair and a long beard. He
Speaker 1: represents Guy. Next comes R and Go Start a three
Speaker 1: piece suit, sharp mutton chops and shiny black shoes. He's
Speaker 1: the preacher. Next is Paul McCartney the corpse, shoeless in
Speaker 1: the suit. Finally, George Harrison is dressed in all denim,
Speaker 1: a durable working class outfit. He's an undertaker now. He
Speaker 1: says he's interpretations very but he thinks that the Beatles
Speaker 1: are basically putting us on. He personally doesn't believe that
Speaker 1: Paul is dead, but he does believe the Beatles are
Speaker 1: in or management are basically playing in to the rumors
Speaker 1: to help people. Uh give a subtle nod to the
Speaker 1: people at home, and I say to all that white
Speaker 1: people have a freedom that nobody else says. Good for you,
Speaker 1: white people for being able to have antics of murdered
Speaker 1: people on your album covers and still be celebrating. It's
Speaker 1: it's a fun game you guys get to play, and
Speaker 1: I'm very jealous of it. Anyway, my guest today, I'm
Speaker 1: super excited that he's here. We often talk to comedians,
Speaker 1: but we don't often talk to bright people, and this
Speaker 1: is an exciting turn of events for us. He's great,
Speaker 1: brilliant thinker. You know him as a writer or at
Speaker 1: the Root dot com. Please give it up for my guests,
Speaker 1: Mr Michael Harriet, and thank you for having, Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: excited you're here. Paul McCartney is supposed to be a lie.
Speaker 1: He's supposed to be dead because he's one of the
Speaker 1: two Beatles that technically is quote unquote still alive. But
Speaker 1: there was a theory that when he was in a
Speaker 1: car crash in the sixties I think it's the sixties,
Speaker 1: that he had died in that car crash, and they
Speaker 1: replaced him with like a double and kept like living
Speaker 1: the life out of Paul McCartney despite the fact that
Speaker 1: he was a dead man. So you want to hear
Speaker 1: an interesting story before we get started. So years ago, right,
Speaker 1: and I can't remember with you, right, but there was
Speaker 1: a preacher in the Detroit who wanted to raise money
Speaker 1: for the civil rights movement. Bought Morton was the king
Speaker 1: up right, and all the stars showed up and they
Speaker 1: just want They didn't really I guess they gave money,
Speaker 1: but they were really there because everybody was talking about
Speaker 1: this preacher's daughter. So they kept asking, are you gonna
Speaker 1: let the preachers daughter sing? But the king didn't want
Speaker 1: them to let the girls seek because she was fourteen
Speaker 1: years old and she was pregnant. Uh. But finally the
Speaker 1: organ he says, look, I'm not going to play for
Speaker 1: anyone unless you let this girl sing. She comes out,
Speaker 1: blows the audience away, gets a record contract. Her name
Speaker 1: is Aretha Franklin. Damn. So okay, all right, and and
Speaker 1: this this gets crazy right. One of the people there
Speaker 1: at the concept was Little Richard. He asked the organ
Speaker 1: player to go on tour with him, and the organ
Speaker 1: player goes on tour with him, meets the Beatles in Germany,
Speaker 1: and to this day, that organ player, Billy Preston, is
Speaker 1: the only musician besides the Beatles that's ever been credited
Speaker 1: on the Beatles album beat all because Martin Luther King
Speaker 1: didn't want because all because Martin Luther King was being
Speaker 1: a hater and trying to keep this young lady from
Speaker 1: shining and doing the thing that she wanted to do.
Speaker 1: And now that we get this, yeah, this organ player
Speaker 1: says no, I won't and he becomes the man and
Speaker 1: she becomes the lady. Ah, that's a great story. Yeah. See,
Speaker 1: this is the kind of utility that comedians don't bring
Speaker 1: to the podcast we just talked about. But stuff, and
Speaker 1: that ain't helpful that I need. I need good stories
Speaker 1: like this one. But stuff too though. Good thank god,
Speaker 1: because I'm not planning on changing who I am. Uh So,
Speaker 1: as long as we're both at home, we'll we'll have
Speaker 1: a great time together. I'm excited about your conspiracy theory
Speaker 1: because I think that it it sort of is an
Speaker 1: umbrella conspiracy theory, if that makes sense. It really hits
Speaker 1: a lot of places all at once, in a way
Speaker 1: that I think other conspiracy theories are not often able
Speaker 1: to do. But you said, my mama told me white
Speaker 1: people ain't got no sense. Yeah, man, Um, So the
Speaker 1: back story is, and I was raising a small town
Speaker 1: in South Carolina, and like the weird thing about the
Speaker 1: town is that the black part of town, where the
Speaker 1: black people live, is a perfect square. And I was home,
Speaker 1: and my mom she was, well, Mom, everybody in my family,
Speaker 1: my my mom or sisters were black panthers, and so
Speaker 1: she homeschooled us. And so I really never met or
Speaker 1: was around white people until I was a teenager. I
Speaker 1: started going to the public school. And whenever you would
Speaker 1: ask anything about like something you'd see on TV, is
Speaker 1: it true? And she's like, well, you know, white people
Speaker 1: ain't got no sense. And and so when I went
Speaker 1: to school, they skipped me two grades and put me
Speaker 1: in this gifted and talented program, and I realized, like
Speaker 1: all of these one I was the only black kid
Speaker 1: in this program, and I was smaller than everybody else.
Speaker 1: But they weren't particularly smarter than all their black kids
Speaker 1: in the neighborhood that I grew up in. And I
Speaker 1: realized they're not that smart. My mom was right. Why
Speaker 1: people ain't got no sense and they just know the
Speaker 1: system and it manifest thing manifests itself in all kinds
Speaker 1: of ways throughout my life. Man, you know what I
Speaker 1: think about, Like, they think we are less intelligent because
Speaker 1: they define what intelligence is, right, sure, so so think
Speaker 1: about this, right, So what is intelligence? Right? So if
Speaker 1: you do calculus in your head, is that intelligent? Right?
Speaker 1: So think about this. Take stuff, Corey, what he's doing
Speaker 1: when he's shooting a shot on one leg being pushed
Speaker 1: and fouled, Is he's calculating a paraveler or the fly
Speaker 1: right in his head? Like, that's gotta be a sort
Speaker 1: of intelligence. Because he's not stronger than anybody else. He's
Speaker 1: not bigger than anybody else. He's not bigger than anybody else.
Speaker 1: He's just it's just his mind has a level of
Speaker 1: accuracy in the ability to calculate that I don't have.
Speaker 1: That's the sort of intelligence. I love what you're saying here,
Speaker 1: because I do think that it's often overlooked and a
Speaker 1: very difficult conversation to sometimes have with people. Is that,
Speaker 1: to your point, intelligence became this standardized conversation. You're either
Speaker 1: smart or you aren't, and the standard was set by
Speaker 1: a very specific group of people. You all decided, Okay,
Speaker 1: it's going to require you to take this many Trigg
Speaker 1: classes and learn these kinds of literature to qualify how
Speaker 1: smart you are, when in fact, there's a bunch of
Speaker 1: motherfucker's running around here who are real smart and real
Speaker 1: good at stuff that the average person, even if they're
Speaker 1: exceptional students, could never pull off. Right right, man, I was.
Speaker 1: I was listening to the one of the people who
Speaker 1: started Rockefeller Records with Jay Z and Kareem Bigs, and
Speaker 1: so Kareem Biggs was saying, there was another guy on
Speaker 1: the podcast it was just like a a worker at Rockefeller,
Speaker 1: and he said he was so sad when Rockefeller uh
Speaker 1: sold itself right, And Karim says, well, we always knew,
Speaker 1: like just being from the streets just being in the
Speaker 1: game that there was going to be a point where
Speaker 1: they offered someone offered us more money then this record
Speaker 1: company was worth, right, And that's when we just had
Speaker 1: to decide what that amount was. And our whole journey
Speaker 1: was deciding what that amount was. And I was thinking
Speaker 1: about that, like these three guys from the streets, man,
Speaker 1: they that's a really a master's level economics class opportunity, cause, right,
Speaker 1: but they just figured that shot out themselves, right, that
Speaker 1: at some point, look, somebody's gonna try to buy out
Speaker 1: this business, and we have to decide collectively what this
Speaker 1: business is worth. And you know, you calculating the fact
Speaker 1: that like they weren't even friends at the time, which
Speaker 1: complicates like, okay, how do you split up this business
Speaker 1: that otherwise we would have probably shared equally or whatever
Speaker 1: the funk their plan was. But to your point, it's
Speaker 1: like they didn't have to take an economy class to
Speaker 1: figure that out. They just kind of they knew they
Speaker 1: were able to to figure that out on their own.
Speaker 1: And that is a massive amount of intelligence that we
Speaker 1: never celebrate through it's certainly through any traditional learning, right,
Speaker 1: because they just I think what I learned, right, is
Speaker 1: that by me learning outside of school and then going
Speaker 1: to school because I'm really always tell people I've never
Speaker 1: really never learned anything in a classroom. But I realized
Speaker 1: that what school does is teach you how to absorb
Speaker 1: the information and the way that they're giving it to you.
Speaker 1: I remember one time, man, I was my mom used
Speaker 1: to teach vacation Bible school, and we went to vacation
Speaker 1: Bible school one day and they asked me, like I
Speaker 1: was like six seven years old, and he asked me
Speaker 1: my time tables, and I didn't know my time tables. Man,
Speaker 1: My mom was sold Harris. She made me go home
Speaker 1: and learn my time tables. But here's the thing, right,
Speaker 1: I just got on the captin that I figured out
Speaker 1: how multiplication works. But I know no one ever told me.
Speaker 1: Just think about this, No one ever told you like, oh,
Speaker 1: you don't have to learn past twelve, Like, why don't
Speaker 1: we stop at twelve? Right? Like, nobody can answer that
Speaker 1: question for me? Why don't we stop learning? God Like?
Speaker 1: And so I went to school years later, and we
Speaker 1: would take these time tests every Thursday, these time math
Speaker 1: tests in the teacher and take off points for me
Speaker 1: not showing my work. And I was like, what you
Speaker 1: need showing your work? Like you don't know your sixteen timetables.
Speaker 1: You don't know why am I needing to demonstrate math
Speaker 1: to you When I did the math? You like, I
Speaker 1: don't have to show seven times eight, But I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't have to show sixteen times fourteen. It doesn't
Speaker 1: make any sense. It's because you learn it to memorize
Speaker 1: the things that they told you. Listen, one of my
Speaker 1: biggest fears in the world is having And I used
Speaker 1: to be a teacher, but I worked in I worked
Speaker 1: in English, so I had nothing to do with the math.
Speaker 1: But the very idea of somebody coming to me and saying,
Speaker 1: why is one plus one two? Is like, I don't know, bro,
Speaker 1: it just is. That's that's what they told me. That's
Speaker 1: what I'm telling you. What the funk do you want
Speaker 1: from me? Do you know what I mean? They don't
Speaker 1: teach us that, They critically don't teach us to think.
Speaker 1: They teach us to memorize the things that they tell us,
Speaker 1: which is I think, and I don't know if it
Speaker 1: was like this might be. This sounds like a conspiracy theory,
Speaker 1: but it fosters reality that you gotta follow directions for
Speaker 1: the rest of your life. Right Like when people tell
Speaker 1: me something, I automatically as a skeptic saying, well, let
Speaker 1: me find out if this is true. I like what
Speaker 1: you're saying here because I think that this sort of
Speaker 1: circles us back into the conversation about white people and
Speaker 1: their sense or lack thereof is is what we're saying
Speaker 1: is or what you're saying is is that there are
Speaker 1: more things side of lead that we should be skeptical of,
Speaker 1: that we should take a second to at least find
Speaker 1: our own answer for. And instead we are sort of
Speaker 1: like following the rules that are placed in front of
Speaker 1: us because that's how we're conditioned from a young age.
Speaker 1: Like I'm not gonna push back on these things because
Speaker 1: if I do, I'm at risk of whatever the funk
Speaker 1: we think we're at risk of by not, you know,
Speaker 1: exploring further and back to the conspiracy. White people live
Speaker 1: in a world that is built for them. It's built
Speaker 1: off of the ways that they were taught, and then
Speaker 1: it's it's like living in a padded room for your
Speaker 1: entire life and thinking you're indestructible. M right. They think
Speaker 1: that they're stronger, like I got strong the wall. Well,
Speaker 1: you living in a world that is padded for you.
Speaker 1: Oh no, dog, I like walls against my shoulder. It
Speaker 1: don't even affect me. It's like no, Actually, regular walls
Speaker 1: hurt a lot. And if you just tried the regular wall,
Speaker 1: I ensure you you'll feel differently about all of this. Also,
Speaker 1: there's something I'm really curious about and what you're saying,
Speaker 1: because you're talking about your mom homeschooling you and never
Speaker 1: introducing you to like white information, right that Like she
Speaker 1: she starts you off by just learning what she would
Speaker 1: consider non white information up to this point. And I'm
Speaker 1: wondering what that is, you know what I mean. I'm
Speaker 1: a person who I didn't I wasn't homeschooled. I went
Speaker 1: to white schools and white institutions, not my whole life,
Speaker 1: but most of my life. And I'm curious what what
Speaker 1: qualified specifically as non white stuff up to that point, right,
Speaker 1: And so I don't think it's like she wasn't teaching
Speaker 1: to be like like playing and speeches in my sleep,
Speaker 1: but it was like it was like, you don't know,
Speaker 1: she might have been playing that sleep and that's why
Speaker 1: you're in here now. But people tell me a lot.
Speaker 1: I don't know how to talk to white people because
Speaker 1: I think when I look at people, we inherit a
Speaker 1: subconscious deference to white people that like we don't even realize,
Speaker 1: like even as unapologetic as we want to be, a
Speaker 1: lot of people don't realize that they have it right.
Speaker 1: Like I don't think white people are smarter when I
Speaker 1: go into a classroom. When I was growing up, she
Speaker 1: would change all of the names and the books that
Speaker 1: you like if if she would buy us regular books, right,
Speaker 1: she would change them to like the names of our
Speaker 1: cousins and the names of our and so right. And
Speaker 1: so we live in a world where like subconsciously we
Speaker 1: think we are like planets for involving around the white sun.
Speaker 1: And I've never had that thing. I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: I just assumed that there were and sometimes, like a teenager,
Speaker 1: there were more black people in America the white people,
Speaker 1: Like I just I mostly saw like that was a
Speaker 1: shot to be right. And so so I talked to
Speaker 1: white people still to this day, like I talked to
Speaker 1: black people, and they a lot of times take it
Speaker 1: as an insult, right, just because I talked to him
Speaker 1: like black familiarity of a human that that is not
Speaker 1: better than you, that does not require some sort of
Speaker 1: like code switching, as it were, to to make them
Speaker 1: feel comfortable. It's just hey, mother, this is welcome home.
Speaker 1: Like just like one of the things that kind of
Speaker 1: went viral last year was I saw this clip of
Speaker 1: Pete Buddhaja is talking about black people need role bottles.
Speaker 1: You know, that's how you prove the schools right. And
Speaker 1: so you know, I could have written something that said,
Speaker 1: you know this is wrong, but I talked to him
Speaker 1: like people in the are neighborhood. The title of article
Speaker 1: is Pete buddha Jar just a lying motherfucker, right, because
Speaker 1: he relying. You can't go to Harvard and study as
Speaker 1: much information and consume as much information as he has.
Speaker 1: And then your answer to improving the school system is
Speaker 1: we need role models. But you know, the average white
Speaker 1: school districts gets fifty dollars more per student then the
Speaker 1: average black majority black school district. You know that black
Speaker 1: schools don't have the kind of algebra and and high
Speaker 1: mass classes that black school What you want to say
Speaker 1: is about role models. Black women are the most educated
Speaker 1: group of people in the country, gerally, the most educated,
Speaker 1: and so how are you gonna be in a black
Speaker 1: neighborhood adult see a role model as far as Rode right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: y'all put us in these neighborhoods. So black people live
Speaker 1: next to lawyers and doctors and engineers and garbagemen, and
Speaker 1: people work at McDonald's. Every black person knows a black
Speaker 1: somebody black successful. So I mean, it's a stupid argument
Speaker 1: to make. And the only person who was making is
Speaker 1: somebody who was just a rule full of white people
Speaker 1: and decided a lot to make them feel right. And
Speaker 1: I think, I think you're getting into something that I've
Speaker 1: I've been feeling a lot lately, is that we we
Speaker 1: constantly in this country, are finding ourselves in these negotiations
Speaker 1: right where like Pete Buddha Jedges is put in front
Speaker 1: of us and we're told that he's a good guy,
Speaker 1: this is a nice man, and we should let the
Speaker 1: nice man say things about a community that he supposedly
Speaker 1: cares about. But the reality is he don't know nothing
Speaker 1: about black people. He doesn't have any business talking about
Speaker 1: black people, And the fact that he happens to come
Speaker 1: from a minority community as a queer person doesn't make
Speaker 1: him any more connected to us, So he doesn't get
Speaker 1: to speak from a position of expertise, and we shouldn't
Speaker 1: sit there and pretend like he could just because he's
Speaker 1: quote unquote a nice man, right exactly when he got
Speaker 1: you got to parents who were professors, You went to
Speaker 1: one of the most elite private schools in America. And
Speaker 1: you're gonna tell me, like you know about black schools,
Speaker 1: how now you would you went to an elite private school,
Speaker 1: didn you? With the Harvard what you know? And you're
Speaker 1: the mayor of a city that mostly complains about how
Speaker 1: indifferent you are to its black population. It's not like
Speaker 1: we're sitting on like a dude who's demonstrated years of
Speaker 1: care and carefulness in the way that each treated the community.
Speaker 1: He's judging in front of a room full of white people, right.
Speaker 1: And the crazy thing is is when you think about
Speaker 1: like all of that stuff that we've been saying, right
Speaker 1: to have a system and a world in a country
Speaker 1: like that and just go blindly along, you can't have
Speaker 1: any sense to live the world. Right, Like lived an
Speaker 1: apartment with thin walls and you heard the man next
Speaker 1: door beat his wife every night. You just put in
Speaker 1: ear plugs. You don't have any sense. Bro, Yeah, you
Speaker 1: don't have the calm, not even comes in that you
Speaker 1: don't have humanity in you. Yes, I love what you're
Speaker 1: saying here because I think that that, at its essence
Speaker 1: really will help clarify for our listeners exactly what not
Speaker 1: having sense is. So it's not that the system in
Speaker 1: and of itself means that white people don't have sense.
Speaker 1: The system was built by you. Obviously you're gonna try to,
Speaker 1: you know, thrive in the system that's built by you
Speaker 1: white people. Good for you, I guess, I don't know.
Speaker 1: But more importantly, this undying faith in a system that
Speaker 1: is clearly flawed, that it's clearly broken and clearly not
Speaker 1: assisting anyone else around it, and then being like, yes
Speaker 1: for everybody, we're good. Well, I don't know, figure it
Speaker 1: out is insane. And so yeah, y'all ain't got no sense.
Speaker 1: As long as you keep selling the system to me,
Speaker 1: you out of your damn mind right to know black
Speaker 1: people go to a furious schools and to think that
Speaker 1: less intelligence, you can't have any sense to think that
Speaker 1: there is something innate about black people that makes them
Speaker 1: keep getting shot to the by the police like we
Speaker 1: we magnetic bullets, like all these delicious bullets, I can't
Speaker 1: get another. The hell are you thinking? There is no
Speaker 1: logical answer to all of these disparities except racism, or
Speaker 1: the world doesn't make sense, like to think you live
Speaker 1: in a logical world and to see these disparities and
Speaker 1: to keep skating by like a figure skater in the Olympics. Bro,
Speaker 1: you can't have the sense. White people ain't got no sense.
Speaker 1: You ain't got no sense White people. You're skating by,
Speaker 1: But we're tying your heart and then we're gonna sunk
Speaker 1: up your knees. We're coming. We're coming for your knees.
Speaker 1: White people were done with this ship, all right, We're
Speaker 1: gonna take a break, moving back with more Michaelariat and more,
Speaker 1: my mama told me. And we are back. Yeah, we're
Speaker 1: back here with more Michael Harriet more. My mama told
Speaker 1: me it was fun watching your face through those drops.
Speaker 1: You had no idea what was happening, and honestly me neither.
Speaker 1: I'll just be pressing stuff and it's all a surprise
Speaker 1: every single time. You're you're obviously a journalist, You're a
Speaker 1: man who knows a lot of stuff. I would love
Speaker 1: to dig into some research about your subject specifically, because
Speaker 1: it's such a broad conversation, I thought one of the
Speaker 1: most effective ways to enter this in terms of like
Speaker 1: a tempting to add a little bit of uh qualifying
Speaker 1: to it, was to talk a little bit about whether
Speaker 1: or not appealing to people's humanity actually works. Right, how
Speaker 1: much of us actually attempting to get white people to
Speaker 1: see us as human beings is an effective effort or
Speaker 1: if it's just all in vain? Would you consider that
Speaker 1: a fair entrance than not an easy one, but certainly
Speaker 1: a fair one. Oh, yes, Yes, it's a subject I
Speaker 1: right to talk a lot about. So I found a
Speaker 1: little bit on this article from and it was really
Speaker 1: more of a case study from this uh from the
Speaker 1: European Journal of Social Psychology that basically suggested, and this
Speaker 1: was really fascinating, that appealing to common humanity actually reduces
Speaker 1: social change, that it doesn't make things better, It actually
Speaker 1: makes things socially worse, but it does increase the connection
Speaker 1: and sort of like bonding in smaller social sub sets.
Speaker 1: So it doesn't fix humanity, but it does make us
Speaker 1: feel closer in these smaller groups. Yeah, yeah, I could
Speaker 1: definitely believe that, right, Like we see it all throughout history. Right,
Speaker 1: So let's take like he's a subject that everybody knows
Speaker 1: about the civil rights movement, right, So the civil rights
Speaker 1: movement we often think about like because now we want
Speaker 1: lu the gig is his great hero, right, we are
Speaker 1: forget about white people hated Martin Luther the Gag, but
Speaker 1: he died. Martin Luther King was literally one of the
Speaker 1: most peaceful people in the American history, and the FBI
Speaker 1: wrote him a letter and told him to kill himself, right, right, So,
Speaker 1: so you know, if you you can't get any more
Speaker 1: placid and innocuous as Martin Luther King. He said, we
Speaker 1: are going to fight hate with love, and they killed
Speaker 1: him for that. So if you if love is the
Speaker 1: greatest thing that you can offer to humanity, and that's
Speaker 1: what you offered to humanity, that was his message, and
Speaker 1: they killed him, then there is no logical reason to
Speaker 1: believe that appealing to white people's humanity will get us anyway. Uh.
Speaker 1: In the year nineteen nineteen, there were hundreds of riots
Speaker 1: all across the United States and what's called the Red
Speaker 1: Summer of nineteen nineteen. And the reason those riots existed,
Speaker 1: like they just popped up all across the United States
Speaker 1: was because for the first time, black soldiers had gone
Speaker 1: into the army and fought in World War One, and
Speaker 1: when they returned, white people were upset generally because they
Speaker 1: were looking them in the eyes and treating them, treating
Speaker 1: white people as their equals. Right, because they had been
Speaker 1: in the Paris, all over Europe and the Netherlands and
Speaker 1: in Africa, and they came back in the head month
Speaker 1: and and white people killed them for that, right, Your
Speaker 1: white people, uh felt very frustrated that black people came
Speaker 1: back with confidence and a new self esteem and they
Speaker 1: were like, fuck this, I'd rather you die than believe
Speaker 1: in yourself. Right. So there is no reason to think
Speaker 1: that appealing like just simple appeal to humanity will give
Speaker 1: us some sort of like leg like. But first of all,
Speaker 1: we exist in this world. So if they don't see
Speaker 1: us as humans from the beginning, it is hard to
Speaker 1: imagine what else we could do to engender that mm hmm.
Speaker 1: So one of the things that the study says, and
Speaker 1: I think that this is super useful to what you're
Speaker 1: already pointing out with examples, is that basically humans tend
Speaker 1: to categorize themselves, whether uh intentionally or unintentionally at three
Speaker 1: levels there with increasing sort of like levels of inclusiveness.
Speaker 1: There's the personal, the social, and then the grander human right.
Speaker 1: And we're able to shift and expand those groups as necessary,
Speaker 1: depending on who we're talking to and who I guess
Speaker 1: qualifies to fit within those groups. Meaning like, uh, my
Speaker 1: personal might just be my friends and my family. But
Speaker 1: then if my uh, you know, wife now expands my
Speaker 1: group by bringing in a new friend, that person then
Speaker 1: gets under that umbrella. And similarly, in the social, I
Speaker 1: might identify with black people, but then I might also
Speaker 1: identify with like an expanding sense of like minorities depending
Speaker 1: on what's happening in the world or whatever whatever. But
Speaker 1: one of the things that the research sort of shows
Speaker 1: is that it is extremely rare for people to actually
Speaker 1: expand beyond the social into the human. That like, no
Speaker 1: matter what it is we whatever is wrong with human beings,
Speaker 1: we can't ever make it from social meaning that smaller
Speaker 1: subset of black people into world issues. I wonder why
Speaker 1: that is, Like I I wouldn't presume to know why
Speaker 1: that is, but I think just generally human beings, first
Speaker 1: of all, tend to congregate in tribes and groups and
Speaker 1: the other thing is like, just as human animals, right,
Speaker 1: we want an advantage, right, And so you know, if
Speaker 1: you're white and I'm black, you know, the white person
Speaker 1: kind of knows that in America they've got an advantage
Speaker 1: over you, like just living in this country. And I
Speaker 1: think theoretically sometimes they might want to eliminate that advantage,
Speaker 1: like would be a good person theoretical, but that means
Speaker 1: also that they got to compete with more people forward, food, money,
Speaker 1: or whatever. So like I think maybe and I could
Speaker 1: see generally what white people might want to, like in
Speaker 1: their heads, say we are all one, but when it
Speaker 1: comes push comes to shove, right, and it's one piece
Speaker 1: of meat, yeah, and you hungry and I'm hungry, you
Speaker 1: want the whole piece of meat, or you want to
Speaker 1: spend with the black duds, right. And I think that's
Speaker 1: a really important thing that it sort of gets into,
Speaker 1: is that this subgrouping, this aligning. Right. So like in
Speaker 1: the case of looking at the George Floyd based off
Speaker 1: of what you're talking about, there were a lot of
Speaker 1: people after George Floyd dies who go like, this is awful.
Speaker 1: I hate that this is happening to black people. I
Speaker 1: want to do something, but effectively, if we're truly being honest,
Speaker 1: if we're living in a world where people are truly
Speaker 1: being honest, there's not that much you can do without
Speaker 1: stealing food from your own mouth. And so because people
Speaker 1: are unwilling to fully steal the food from their own mouth,
Speaker 1: y'all ain't gonna do that much. You're gonna feel bad.
Speaker 1: You ain't gonna necessarily like, uh, party in the streets
Speaker 1: about the ship. But no, dog, I'm not going hungry.
Speaker 1: I figure it out. You we all eating, go ahead
Speaker 1: right right, like, because I mean, the truth is this,
Speaker 1: I mean, this ship is hard to being black, right,
Speaker 1: and like I want to be with you, bro, but
Speaker 1: like you know that good shot by the Boldies and
Speaker 1: schools and you know, people follow you around at the
Speaker 1: store like I don't get you, man, But like, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm gonna let you have this one. This
Speaker 1: ain't really my thing. People generally seek the easier path
Speaker 1: in life. M hum. And then I think I think
Speaker 1: part of what's interesting in this study that they did
Speaker 1: was they did find that the most common way that
Speaker 1: people did appeal to humanity or sort of recategorized for humanity,
Speaker 1: was actually coming from the victims of these situations. So
Speaker 1: it's super unlikely that somebody who is the perpetrator of
Speaker 1: the crime to then like recognize the humanity in the
Speaker 1: person that they hurt. Nazis ain't going to see Jews
Speaker 1: as human vice versa. It's more likely that Jews, the
Speaker 1: victims of this crime, are able to see the humanity
Speaker 1: in the Nazis, in part because it's the only way
Speaker 1: that you can move forward in your own life and
Speaker 1: your own subgroups. That like, if you spend your whole
Speaker 1: life sort of being engulfed in this hatred, you're never
Speaker 1: going to be able to like take steps forward and
Speaker 1: then eventually like build a life, be happy, grow as
Speaker 1: a human all that stuff, right, is that commonality. Then
Speaker 1: it's that commonality where it's like people in a foxhold
Speaker 1: in war, right, we share this thing, we share this moment,
Speaker 1: and that bonds us forever. So so victims are probably
Speaker 1: more likely to bond than like, you know, the people
Speaker 1: who have never suffered those kinds of things. Yes, and
Speaker 1: that's exactly what the study says is that not only
Speaker 1: does it make us appeal to the humanity of our oppressor,
Speaker 1: which is, you know, effectively not helpful, because the oppressor
Speaker 1: doesn't see me as a human at the same time,
Speaker 1: but it also creates a deeper bond with the subgroup
Speaker 1: that I already exist in. So now I'm I'm holding
Speaker 1: super tight to this subgroup and it doesn't allow me
Speaker 1: to see anything past that sort of conversation, right, which
Speaker 1: is really the brilliance of like documents like the Constitution,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Because the Constitution tells you
Speaker 1: all this ship about how valuable all humans are, that
Speaker 1: like every man is created equal, we all have these
Speaker 1: inalienable rights, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. But
Speaker 1: the reality is you're talking to very specific people who
Speaker 1: are going to see themselves in a very specific subgroup
Speaker 1: group and never actually see the other humans involved in
Speaker 1: this conversation. So you're only affirming the evils and people
Speaker 1: and not actually actualizing the ship that we really need,
Speaker 1: which is all of us being legit equal. It makes
Speaker 1: me wonder what's the what the answer is though, Like
Speaker 1: if you can't appeal to someone's humanity, then what do
Speaker 1: you appeal to? And Like I have this theory that
Speaker 1: you have to convince people that the dumb stuff that
Speaker 1: they're doing the dumb ship they're doing hurts them. Racism
Speaker 1: hurt white people too. Write Like I was talking about diversity, right,
Speaker 1: like people look at diversity like say you own a
Speaker 1: company and you're trying to increase your diversity offers. Some
Speaker 1: people look at it as like you being doing something
Speaker 1: beneficial for black people. I was like no, Like when
Speaker 1: you have a more diverse group of people would offer
Speaker 1: perspective working on something, then you have a better You
Speaker 1: end up with a better product. And I was talking
Speaker 1: about the news like for along Tide for years, like
Speaker 1: we don't see no black people on the news, like
Speaker 1: giving us the news and what we got is homogeneous
Speaker 1: perception of the news. And it's interesting to me, Like
Speaker 1: so I remember one of the first news rooms I
Speaker 1: work in it, right, and they would report the news
Speaker 1: like say somebody got shot. They were reported by reading
Speaker 1: the police report, right, And I was like yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: Like the least, the least trustworthy thing in this whole
Speaker 1: equation is the police report, right, Like that's where the
Speaker 1: lies are. They police always, always, always, always lie on
Speaker 1: the police report. Right. And if you go back and
Speaker 1: look at bid the camp footage and compare it to
Speaker 1: police reports, this is invariably true. Right, But when you
Speaker 1: don't have anything but white people in your news room,
Speaker 1: you report the police and and the problem with that
Speaker 1: is it's not because you want to stick it to
Speaker 1: the police or something. You reporting like you want trust
Speaker 1: the source of dudes. Your news is subjectively worse because
Speaker 1: you have all white people who don't know this, right, yes,
Speaker 1: and so bringing into black people the first to find
Speaker 1: your dude room really makes a better product just because
Speaker 1: you just got more. Yeah, I mean, it's to that point.
Speaker 1: It's the motherfucker's writing essays from Wikipedia the first couple
Speaker 1: of years where like you, there was a while where
Speaker 1: we didn't know right where we were like, hey, this
Speaker 1: is kind of like the new encyclopedia, and this is
Speaker 1: a useful resource. And then at some point we realize, oh, ship,
Speaker 1: this is just people writing what they think is correct
Speaker 1: on a document that then gets posted on the internet.
Speaker 1: It may or may not be true, and quite often
Speaker 1: is a very muddied version of the truth. But you
Speaker 1: don't get to keep writing your essay from Wikipedia after
Speaker 1: you've acknowledged that the ship ain't right. And if you do,
Speaker 1: you ain't got no sense you acting up right, They
Speaker 1: said Brianna Taylor was okay, was uninjured when they took
Speaker 1: her to the hospital. They said, boy was was resisting
Speaker 1: and he was fine, like the the officer restrained him
Speaker 1: right like until we saw the footage. Remember Walter Scott
Speaker 1: in South Carolina. They said that he attacked the police
Speaker 1: officer and a man was running away opposite direction. One
Speaker 1: of the more important things that you're also getting to,
Speaker 1: and this is a little complicated, is is the ways
Speaker 1: in which they create these subgroups, or forced us rather
Speaker 1: to create our own subgroups through this victimization, through these
Speaker 1: offenses that are happening to unlike people in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways. That like, despite the fact that you and
Speaker 1: I are black, or even better example, despite the fact
Speaker 1: that George Floyd and I are both black, that's pretty
Speaker 1: much the end of the ship we have in common,
Speaker 1: right like that, ain't a dude who like in any
Speaker 1: under any other circumstances. You place us in a room
Speaker 1: where I just vibe with him, We ain't. We ain't
Speaker 1: got that much to talk about if the man kept living.
Speaker 1: But unfortunately, because of the crimes that you all keep
Speaker 1: committing over and over again, I'm forced to create a
Speaker 1: subgroup with a person who otherwise would not be my subgroup,
Speaker 1: would not be in my personal circle. But I would
Speaker 1: argue that that you didn't create the subgroup, right, that
Speaker 1: that you you just realized that you were in the subgroup.
Speaker 1: It's forced on us. We probably grew up on different
Speaker 1: sides in the country and different worlds and different upbringings,
Speaker 1: and this one thing that brings us together wasn't created
Speaker 1: by us, Like we didn't manifest this, right We in
Speaker 1: a world that are two worlds that are totally different,
Speaker 1: and the one thing we have in common affects our
Speaker 1: lives so much that they outweigh like like like I
Speaker 1: neve go a dirt road in the middle of a
Speaker 1: small set of town bro like, we don't probably don't
Speaker 1: have that much income hell from there in common like
Speaker 1: the average Because this because of these sub groups they created, Yes,
Speaker 1: a pent And I think I think that again is
Speaker 1: like part of the mastery of like the people who
Speaker 1: sat down and I like to think of it as
Speaker 1: like an evil twiddling their fingers sort of group of people.
Speaker 1: But the genius of what they created is they're forcing
Speaker 1: us to live in these subgroups that they created, that
Speaker 1: they spawned and sort of like left us in uh
Speaker 1: that block us from actually seeing the people that are
Speaker 1: like us in similar subgroups. So the reality is that
Speaker 1: there are poor white people in this country who have
Speaker 1: such a difficult time with the word privilege and the
Speaker 1: idea that they somehow have something better than everybody else.
Speaker 1: And the reality is if we could have a real conversation,
Speaker 1: we could clarify exactly what privileges and how it falls
Speaker 1: and whether or not they fall under the categories that
Speaker 1: we're even talking about half the time, But we can't
Speaker 1: have the conversation because it's just black people and white
Speaker 1: people and subgroups and and distinct voices that don't actually
Speaker 1: ever want to see the humanity in the other side.
Speaker 1: It's it's such a complex discussion to have, right, And
Speaker 1: the part about it is right, it's like the controversy
Speaker 1: and the discussion, like we don't get that right, Like
Speaker 1: they are the ones who get fragile when you want
Speaker 1: to have this discussion if we want to talk about
Speaker 1: black on black crime, like I always tell people black
Speaker 1: people don't like black on black crime either. Like we
Speaker 1: got all kinds of fraternities and sororities and church groups
Speaker 1: and and teenage mentorship programs that try to stop it, right,
Speaker 1: So we want to stop it too. Bro, you can't
Speaker 1: go into a black church and barbershop or beauty salon
Speaker 1: without hearing somebody talk about a nigga who at ship? Right?
Speaker 1: We know the ancient niggas, right, and if because it's
Speaker 1: you know, white people who ain't shipped too, and white
Speaker 1: people know that they got ancient white people. And if
Speaker 1: only we had to worry about just the eight shient
Speaker 1: white people in the ancient niggas will be a lot
Speaker 1: better off than to worry about all the white people. Yes,
Speaker 1: and I love that, And frankly I would love a
Speaker 1: subgroup of ain't ship niggas and a subgroup of ain't
Speaker 1: ship white people to realize, hey, we're the same, we
Speaker 1: ain't shipped together, and then we can we similar Similarly,
Speaker 1: the people who are ship can be like, hey, I'm
Speaker 1: the ship. I don't want nothing to do with whatever
Speaker 1: that is, and we can separate ourselves from it. It's
Speaker 1: it's the way that these subgroups have been created, in
Speaker 1: the way that they're strategically kept in place, is the
Speaker 1: most dangerous, scary part of all of it. I agree
Speaker 1: with that kind of segregation segregated city. You heard of
Speaker 1: your first folks were bringing segregation back, and this time
Speaker 1: ain't ship. Niggas are on the wrong side of the tracks.
Speaker 1: That's the deal. Ain't ain't ship but equal, and that
Speaker 1: that's a hard thing to get to, but we're gonna
Speaker 1: get there. There's one more piece of research that I
Speaker 1: would love to run past you because I started thinking.
Speaker 1: You asked the question, I think it's an important one
Speaker 1: about how do we fix this? Is there any possibility
Speaker 1: for any change in all of this? And I started
Speaker 1: to think, Well, the most literal attempt at fixing it
Speaker 1: is through like diversity training. Right, That's what white people
Speaker 1: always turn to whenever the world is in disarray, They go,
Speaker 1: we got to train our employees to be more aware
Speaker 1: of the other colors out there that it they probably
Speaker 1: know about, but are for whatever reason, treating them differently.
Speaker 1: And one of the things I read a Harvard Business
Speaker 1: Review study that sort of talked about the effectiveness of
Speaker 1: diversity training, and evidence show that little change or of
Speaker 1: their behavior happened from white men specifically, despite an increased
Speaker 1: acknowledgement of bias around them. So throughout like the six
Speaker 1: months of diversity training that they went through. Nobody changed
Speaker 1: their behavior, but they all went, hey, I see that
Speaker 1: this is fucked up more than I saw it was
Speaker 1: fucked up beforehand. And in fact, the only group that
Speaker 1: did change their behavior was women. Women tended to be
Speaker 1: a little more open to, like, uh, to experiencing other
Speaker 1: groups and other people. But one of the things they
Speaker 1: pointed out was it was largely junior employee women at
Speaker 1: the office who were attempting to now reach out to
Speaker 1: all kinds of people above them, recognizing that like, yo,
Speaker 1: this world is fucked up, and I gotta get help
Speaker 1: wherever I can find it, or resources wherever I can
Speaker 1: find it, because I'm naturally gonna be mistreated as a
Speaker 1: woman in these positions already. I yes, when you think
Speaker 1: about it, though, right when you are in a space
Speaker 1: like that, like corporate America, the people generally at the
Speaker 1: top are people who are able to set set aside
Speaker 1: emotion for the sake of like their savages, right, like
Speaker 1: people who The best football players could play through pain, right,
Speaker 1: and they'll hit the hell out of you. They don't
Speaker 1: want to top of you, bro, they want to knock
Speaker 1: you out. The best basketball players can pay play through paining.
Speaker 1: The best bankers will steal your house from under you, Like,
Speaker 1: I don't care if you ain't got got your boys.
Speaker 1: I don't give if you just two days later bro
Speaker 1: that my house, my company gets the profit, and now
Speaker 1: I'm at the top of the heap. So I would
Speaker 1: imagine that those are mostly men who have been First
Speaker 1: of all, we are are trained to SUBVERTI feelings. Right,
Speaker 1: So by the time you get to to the real world, right,
Speaker 1: like you've been talking about the cry, you've been talked
Speaker 1: not to empathize with another human being, right, And so
Speaker 1: that is the vacuum that allows inequality to flourish. But
Speaker 1: it's also this to the crazy thing about it. It
Speaker 1: is the it's all sort of thing that allows you
Speaker 1: to get ahead. Right. Yeah. I think you especially are
Speaker 1: hitting something on the head with talking about capitalism, right,
Speaker 1: because at the end of the day, so much of
Speaker 1: what whiteness is is cooked into capitalism, and it's part
Speaker 1: of how they are able to not see the humanity
Speaker 1: in other groups. Is like, look, I'm playing the game.
Speaker 1: I'm just playing the game the way the game is
Speaker 1: set up to be played. I'm following the rules as
Speaker 1: I know them presented to me, not acknowledging that like, hey,
Speaker 1: the game might be kind of fucked up, like maybe
Speaker 1: this ain't how games should be played, or certainly we
Speaker 1: if we are going to play him this way, you
Speaker 1: should at least be acknowledging like that. I could, I
Speaker 1: don't know, consider the game in a different way than
Speaker 1: I've been playing it the whole time. But instead you're
Speaker 1: able to treat it like a game, thus detaching yourself
Speaker 1: from these other groups, and subsequently, even when you're not
Speaker 1: playing the game, i e. Going to work or shutting
Speaker 1: down an orphanage because you want to put up a
Speaker 1: parking lot, whatever the funk it is, you then detached
Speaker 1: from the humans because they effectively will make the game
Speaker 1: harder for you in the future. I agree with you,
Speaker 1: and going back to the study that you introduced earlier,
Speaker 1: that is why I think that appealing to humanity does
Speaker 1: not work. What you have to do it's not convinced
Speaker 1: them that the game is fucked up because it's sucked
Speaker 1: up for us. You have to appeal to them and
Speaker 1: say the game is fucked up because it's funed up
Speaker 1: for you too, right, so you wouldn't have to stifle
Speaker 1: all this pain to get ahead if you just allowed
Speaker 1: everybody to flourish instead of boarding all of the resources
Speaker 1: for yourself, just take for something like taxes. Right, so
Speaker 1: white people don't want to pay a lot of people
Speaker 1: don't want to Conservatives, they don't want, for instance, welfare
Speaker 1: or socialized medicine because it will take their tax money.
Speaker 1: And for a lot of people trying to do you say, well,
Speaker 1: this will help people. There have a lot of people said,
Speaker 1: you know, look at a little Timmy coffin. What's you
Speaker 1: gonna do abou him? You can let no Timy diet,
Speaker 1: Timmy die. What you do it, bro? What you do
Speaker 1: is you say, look, everybody, it's gotta have healthcare. Bro,
Speaker 1: your healthcare costs so much because you're paying for a
Speaker 1: little Timmy's call anyway you going to back. It's against
Speaker 1: a law of let Timmity die. So what we could
Speaker 1: do is give everybody some healthcare and instead of them
Speaker 1: gouging you because they know you got the insurance plan
Speaker 1: and so they paid the little Timmy cough on yours
Speaker 1: and a little bit for themselves, we just give everybody
Speaker 1: something and say you gotta take what we give you,
Speaker 1: and then little Timmy ain't coughing and they ain't taking
Speaker 1: all of yours. But now if you want to hoard
Speaker 1: the resources and let little Timmy cough, it's fucked up,
Speaker 1: not because a little Timmy cough, bro, but because they're
Speaker 1: fucking you too, right, white people. But like when you
Speaker 1: have bad schools, you have high unemployment, you have high unemployment,
Speaker 1: you have high crime. What do you think those people
Speaker 1: who are broke and unemployed and uneducated going to do.
Speaker 1: They're gonna break your car window. And when you break
Speaker 1: your car when you're gonna say, ah, the niggers. Now
Speaker 1: it's the world. It's the system that you wanted that
Speaker 1: fucked up your car window. Yeah, And to that point,
Speaker 1: we could create a system where we catch little to
Speaker 1: me before he even starts coughing, which effectively saves you money.
Speaker 1: It effectively keeps your car window from being broken in.
Speaker 1: It's all the things you're saying that we could stop
Speaker 1: it onto minority reports ship before we even get there,
Speaker 1: but instead you're allowing it to get to the worst
Speaker 1: case scenario and then hoarding resources under the presumption that
Speaker 1: a bunch of people are going to continue to be
Speaker 1: sick and misbehave simply because that's just how we get
Speaker 1: down and that ain't it right? Well, I mean, we know,
Speaker 1: like I'm looking at sociological visa, that crime correlates to
Speaker 1: poverty more than it correl's color, more than it carlates
Speaker 1: to whether you grew up in a city or rural area,
Speaker 1: more than it correls to anything that correlates to poverty.
Speaker 1: So if you could just get people to stop being poor,
Speaker 1: did you you decrease crime? How do you do that?
Speaker 1: You got to educate them, So why are you giving
Speaker 1: all the poorest people the worst education. You gotta give
Speaker 1: them some better education than even if some of the
Speaker 1: white kids are getting and then you have more educated people,
Speaker 1: are more education populists equals lower crime and everybody's living.
Speaker 1: But if you don't, little Timmy's carfin and they're gonna
Speaker 1: break your call with I think perfectly said, we're gonna
Speaker 1: take one more break. We'll be back with more Michael
Speaker 1: Harriet and more, my mama told me, and we are bad.
Speaker 1: You got what I need. Yeah, we're back here with
Speaker 1: more Michael Harriet, more of my mama told me. We're
Speaker 1: still talking about the dangers of white people in their
Speaker 1: nonsense thing no sense, and they're creating nonsense all around us,
Speaker 1: which ultimately is adding to the destruction of the world
Speaker 1: humanity as a whole. I would love for us to
Speaker 1: close this bad boy out with the game. If you're
Speaker 1: down for it, let's play uh, a fun game that
Speaker 1: I like to call white lies ugly. You're disgusting. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna kill you. Give me two white lies. This is
Speaker 1: a very fun game where I Michael will introduce to
Speaker 1: you a traditional white conspiracy theory, one that white people
Speaker 1: have maintained for quite a while. And I would love
Speaker 1: for you to just unpack exactly why you think white
Speaker 1: people are so invested in this conspiracy theory. What do
Speaker 1: you think I'm holding onto? Yeah, exactly perfect. This is
Speaker 1: a classic I think you're gonna love it. Uh. White
Speaker 1: people for a while have maintained that most people in
Speaker 1: politics are secretly lizard people. I'm sure you've heard that before,
Speaker 1: that they that they're uh, they're actually like lizard alien
Speaker 1: people from I guess the bottom of the earth. Sometimes
Speaker 1: I hear the bottom of the earth, sometimes I hear
Speaker 1: out of space. But there are lizard people hiding in
Speaker 1: fleshy skin, and they're planning our our ultimate destruction. Despite
Speaker 1: appearing to be uh servants of you know, justice and
Speaker 1: all that other stuff. My question for you is why
Speaker 1: do you think white people referring to our our leaders
Speaker 1: and best as lizard people is so important to them? Okay?
Speaker 1: So I give you to answers, right, so I know
Speaker 1: they a right so perfect. The truth is that this
Speaker 1: idea came from an idea that was generated, like in
Speaker 1: the early Christian Church that the people who were nobility,
Speaker 1: the clergy class, they were actually not just ordained by God, right,
Speaker 1: but they were a different bloodline. Man, Like, like why
Speaker 1: would you peasant in France just think, oh, the guy
Speaker 1: who's leading me is going to pass it down to
Speaker 1: his son and I'm cool with that unless you thought
Speaker 1: like there was some kind of inherited bloodline that was
Speaker 1: different from yours. Right. So that is an idea that
Speaker 1: is generated, that's been generating over other thousands of years. Right,
Speaker 1: And like if you're a white person in America, that
Speaker 1: it seems like the only logical answers you can't get.
Speaker 1: So I don't do y'all have waffle houses in l A, Right,
Speaker 1: I mean you know I'm familiar. I think we're all
Speaker 1: familiar with the waffle house. Actually, So I had this
Speaker 1: thought at Denny's the first time I had But I
Speaker 1: was in the Denny's and it was like after the club.
Speaker 1: It was like three eight m. It was like this
Speaker 1: fifty eight year old white man sweeping up in the
Speaker 1: Denny's at three eight m. And I'm thinking, what the
Speaker 1: funk happening? Like white man in the worst position. But
Speaker 1: those are the people who believe in It's like the
Speaker 1: people who believe in Q or nine right, Like, so
Speaker 1: we know from UM polling data and like the people
Speaker 1: who are more likely to be Trump supporters are uneducated,
Speaker 1: white poor people. Um. You know that's always surprises people that,
Speaker 1: you know, white people, poor white people generally don't vote. Right.
Speaker 1: That's what gave this, you know, this big league because
Speaker 1: when Hillary Clinton ran against him, all the previous data says, well,
Speaker 1: we don't have to worry about the poor white people.
Speaker 1: And that's right. So, so poor white people just think
Speaker 1: about living in a world where and this is a
Speaker 1: quote I stole from nobody, but they have convinced you
Speaker 1: that you're not a loser. You're a winner who just
Speaker 1: hasn't more. And yet that's not why people thinking, right,
Speaker 1: And so the reason they believe in stuff like listed
Speaker 1: people coming from out of space and putting on zipping
Speaker 1: up human skin and controlling the world. Is the only
Speaker 1: other choice a poor, uneducated white person as is to
Speaker 1: believe that he ain't did enough in his life because
Speaker 1: you are all the opportunities you have the world that
Speaker 1: is built for you, So why aren't you afraid? My
Speaker 1: mama always said, you know, I mean when you talk
Speaker 1: about people with average intelligence, that means like half of
Speaker 1: the world is below average and and so. But nobody
Speaker 1: thinks they're they're dumb. Nobody thinks that they're dumb, and
Speaker 1: nobody thinks they're dress bad, and everybody thinks they're funny.
Speaker 1: That's three things that you can always invadibly count on.
Speaker 1: That's why people who make you laugh are generally more
Speaker 1: intelligent than people who are serious. And I'm not just
Speaker 1: in it because I'm I'm a comedian. That's actual, like
Speaker 1: like generally to a lot of people to write to
Speaker 1: sell my own brand. Oh you don't know, like like
Speaker 1: there are studies that shows like people in comedy have
Speaker 1: higher i Q. Hell yeah, Like I'll take it. Sure
Speaker 1: it's the standardized white tests, but hell yeah, I'll own
Speaker 1: that ship, right, And it's probably yeah, because I mean
Speaker 1: you think about what comedy is, like the gift of
Speaker 1: birds and the ability to like kind of pull this
Speaker 1: one joyous emotion out of people. You have that exercise
Speaker 1: of multi to do that. But let's go back to
Speaker 1: the visit people, right, so that things start with Dave
Speaker 1: starting to do named David Ick, who started this, uh
Speaker 1: theory that these wrorior bloodlines. It goes back to the iluminority.
Speaker 1: These people came from outer space and they control the
Speaker 1: world through the system of community cation and sometimes they
Speaker 1: you know, you might catch him with their skins off,
Speaker 1: and that was their goal, Like you don't remember when
Speaker 1: you know this is probably for your tattoo rem Alex
Speaker 1: Jones snuck into this, uh. This the growth where all
Speaker 1: these this is the actual thing, right where all these
Speaker 1: rich people meet every year, like Bill Vision, powerful people,
Speaker 1: and he thought he was going to catch them, like
Speaker 1: he literally thought. He thinking they're gonna be in there
Speaker 1: drinking goat blood and like doing evil ship and they
Speaker 1: were just being regular people, right. But the truth is
Speaker 1: it goes back to what you were talking about earlier, right,
Speaker 1: These subgroups, like victims create subgroups get easier Dan, the
Speaker 1: people who are perpetuating the oppression, right and rich people
Speaker 1: like black people think white people sticking and the white
Speaker 1: people don't stick together. You know, we think rich people
Speaker 1: stick together. Of these people don't stick together, right, Like,
Speaker 1: we have these unfounded notions that the only way these
Speaker 1: people can achieve what they achieve is through some collective effort,
Speaker 1: when the truth is that they have just built a system,
Speaker 1: like they don't wear no white Like if you gave
Speaker 1: me the choice of reconfiguring the school system, the economic system,
Speaker 1: the banking system, having generational wealth, bro, you might think
Speaker 1: I came from out of space, but I would be like,
Speaker 1: like all my people would you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: We'd have the best schools. You know, everybody would be
Speaker 1: clapping or be the laughing at the white people. It
Speaker 1: would be, you know, great potato salad at McDonald's. And
Speaker 1: people would think they must be got no some kind
Speaker 1: of magic. She all of that now, But you you
Speaker 1: built and control a system. I think you're hitting on
Speaker 1: something that that uh certainly is resonating with me. I've
Speaker 1: been watching a ship ton of the Crown lately. I
Speaker 1: don't know if you watch the Crown at all, now
Speaker 1: I hadn't gotten into it. Well, I I like it
Speaker 1: because it's just proof that, uh, it's a lot of
Speaker 1: what you're saying, and and they're all scumbags and gross people,
Speaker 1: but in a very specific way that I'm I'm fascinated by.
Speaker 1: But one of the things that my wife and I
Speaker 1: we're talking about the other day was how insane it
Speaker 1: is that people are rooting for the bloodline of a
Speaker 1: family that's held above them, right that they're literally cheering
Speaker 1: outside because this bloodline has continued of people who are
Speaker 1: going to they're basically paying taxes every year to maintain
Speaker 1: like a giant palace for them to go do stupid
Speaker 1: ship in. And one of the things that I think
Speaker 1: you're getting to is they do legitimately think to cheer
Speaker 1: for them, you have to legitimately think that their blood
Speaker 1: is different than yours, that they are in fact, this
Speaker 1: blessed group that deserves this sort of like celebration. And
Speaker 1: this is where you know the lizard people are slightly
Speaker 1: different but kind of the same. Is that you can
Speaker 1: own in America. You can only make sense of the
Speaker 1: difference that these white people have and the way they've excelled,
Speaker 1: the way they've they've made it is to believe that
Speaker 1: their blood is different than yours, that they're cold blooded
Speaker 1: and sort of like some sort of alien creature, because
Speaker 1: otherwise do you have to make peace with the fact
Speaker 1: that you're just a regular white dude who didn't make
Speaker 1: it despite the math working into your favor. But the crazy,
Speaker 1: you know what, the crazy thing about that is right,
Speaker 1: Like that extends to us too. Right, like the people
Speaker 1: who believe that there are lizard people who control the
Speaker 1: banking industry also believe that we have something in our
Speaker 1: blood that makes us inferior to them. So it's not
Speaker 1: just like the lizard ship like it. It's crazy and
Speaker 1: it don't Again, white people, ain't it sounds like white
Speaker 1: people ain't got no sense. If I told you that
Speaker 1: there were lizard people who won't let me get alone
Speaker 1: and that's why I can't get ahead, you would say,
Speaker 1: he ain't got no sense. But if I got mad
Speaker 1: because a black person moved next door to me, or
Speaker 1: my daughter bought home a black person that she was dating,
Speaker 1: you would say, I mean that seems logical. It is
Speaker 1: the same and sad. Right, it literally doesn't make any sense. Right,
Speaker 1: It is as crazy as lizard people with zip up skin.
Speaker 1: But we've accepted one and don't like both of us
Speaker 1: have accepted the other. Like you have to correct black
Speaker 1: people all the time to like, you know, you I'll
Speaker 1: see black peoples like white people do this with their
Speaker 1: money or white people, you know, they keep their kids
Speaker 1: how to speak before me, I was just correcting somebody
Speaker 1: the other day on too white people tach take kids
Speaker 1: how to speak for Linkol and they actually black people
Speaker 1: are more likely to speak a foreign language than white people.
Speaker 1: Like it's just this thing that we believe because like
Speaker 1: they get better schools and and like white people get
Speaker 1: to keep theble and like do this with they they
Speaker 1: got extra money because it is generational, right, it's intergenerational.
Speaker 1: They have the better schools, they have the better platforms.
Speaker 1: They have it is and it is not that they
Speaker 1: don't work for that money. It is that they have
Speaker 1: placed barriers in front of us so that if we
Speaker 1: put forth the same effort as a medeo a white man,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be poor and that white boy are gonna
Speaker 1: be okay. Yeah, And I love what you're saying, and
Speaker 1: I think it's the almost the perfect note for us
Speaker 1: to end on is that this is truly about maintaining
Speaker 1: a type of a functionality in their own world. That
Speaker 1: to your point, they ain't got no sense, and they
Speaker 1: know they ain't got no sense. But the only way
Speaker 1: that you can keep thriving in a situation where you
Speaker 1: ain't got no sense is to make all of it nonsense.
Speaker 1: Is to make all of it completely nonsensical for everybody
Speaker 1: around you, and then trick a bunch of people who
Speaker 1: do or potentially could have sense into not having sense
Speaker 1: with you. It is all insanity. Nothing makes sense, and
Speaker 1: so you might as well act like they do. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it makes sense and racism exactly. I love it, Michael.
Speaker 1: I think we did it. I think we nailed this
Speaker 1: is this is great. This was super cool. Could you
Speaker 1: tell the people at home where they can find you,
Speaker 1: what cool stuff you have going on? Any of that? So?
Speaker 1: I have a book coming out in the fall called
Speaker 1: Black a F. History. It is blackest History of the
Speaker 1: United States, and I write every day for the voots
Speaker 1: dot com. You can find me on Twitter, Instagram and
Speaker 1: everywhere else at h H A R R. I ot
Speaker 1: to ours win t tell Yeah, so follow him, go
Speaker 1: check out that book, Black A F History. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be dope. And as always, you can follow me at
Speaker 1: Lengthston Kerman and you can please if you want, send
Speaker 1: us drops, send us ideas, send us conspiracy theories, send
Speaker 1: us corrections at my Mama pod at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1: I would love to hear from you and uh by
Speaker 1: my crop chips in your qualibars are racists? Money stuff
Speaker 1: you can't tell me