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Speaker 1: Welcome to Crash Course, a podcast about business, political, and

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Speaker 1: social disruption and what we can learn from it. I'm

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Speaker 1: Tim O'Brien. Today's Crash Course, The Promised Land versus White Supremacy.

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Speaker 1: We white Christians no longer represent the majority of Americans,

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Speaker 1: writes Robert P. Jones, a white Christian. We are no

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Speaker 1: longer capable of setting the nation's course by sheer cultural

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Speaker 1: and political dominance, but there are more than enough of

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Speaker 1: us to decisively derail the future of democracy in America.

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Speaker 1: That's from Robbie's new book, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy,

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Speaker 1: an exploration of the historical foundations of white supremacy in

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Speaker 1: the United States. The book is wide ranging, incisive, and

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Speaker 1: ultimately a call to action from someone steeped in the

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Speaker 1: same culture and moras he examines, I'll read you another excerpt.

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Speaker 1: At its heart, this book sets out to expose the deep,

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Speaker 1: hidden roots of America's current identity crisis. He writes, this

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Speaker 1: moment of reckoning with our fraught and contested heritage is

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Speaker 1: spawning new practices of remembering. It is also generating a

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Speaker 1: visceral and sometimes violent resistance. The fault Line's Robbie examines

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Speaker 1: affect every facet of American life, individuals, families, communities, politics,

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Speaker 1: the economy, and institutions ranging from courts to corporations. Robbie

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Speaker 1: brings skills to this endeavor. He has a widely published

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Speaker 1: and award winning writer, a well regarded polster, and president

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Speaker 1: and founder of the Public Religious Research Institute. He has

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Speaker 1: written two other books and is lavishly trained in religious

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Speaker 1: studies and ministries. Welcome to Crash Course.

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Speaker 2: Robbie, Hi, thanks for having me.

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Speaker 1: We have got a lot to discuss, and since the

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Speaker 1: theme of this one is white supremacy, let's just set

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Speaker 1: the table right there. You know, it's a term that

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Speaker 1: doesn't come easily to many people's lips. Joe Biden gave

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Speaker 1: a speech honoring and remembering the Tall massacre of nineteen

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Speaker 1: twenty one last year. It was the one hundredth anniversary,

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Speaker 1: and I think he was the first US president to

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Speaker 1: utter the term white supremacist or white supremacy. Why do

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Speaker 1: you think that term is still so hard for some

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Speaker 1: people to say.

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Speaker 2: Well, you know, I think what happens, particularly with people

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Speaker 2: who are white, is they think of perhaps the image

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Speaker 2: that comes to mind is some black and white image

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Speaker 2: of people in robes and hoods burning across in the

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Speaker 2: eighteen hundreds or maybe as late as nineteen twenty. But

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Speaker 2: it's still a century back there in our minds, and

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Speaker 2: so we tend to, I think, associate it with something

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Speaker 2: quite extreme and quite long ago that pictures faded. It's

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Speaker 2: black and white. But what I mean by it is

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Speaker 2: actually something a little more familiar to us. And I'll

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Speaker 2: borrow this actually from colleague of mine, Eddie Cloud, who's

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Speaker 2: a professor at Princeton. But you know, he talks about

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Speaker 2: what he calls white supremacy without all the bluster, and

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Speaker 2: it really just means a way of thinking about it

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Speaker 2: and much more everyday terms. It's one of those terms

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Speaker 2: of art. But if you just take the words and

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Speaker 2: flow them around and we talk about the idea of

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Speaker 2: a commitment to the supremacy of whites instead of white supremacy,

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Speaker 2: it gets closer to the meaning that I mean. And

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Speaker 2: so that's very near to us, you know, in our history.

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Speaker 2: You know, during my lifetime, for example, I grew up

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Speaker 2: in Mississippi and went to Jackson Public schools in the

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Speaker 2: state's capital, and the schools didn't get desegregated until I

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Speaker 2: was in third grade. Right, I was born in nineteen

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Speaker 2: sixty eight, right, so this is nineteen seventy six before

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Speaker 2: this happens, and that's you know, two decades beyond Brown v.

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Speaker 2: Board of Education. And it was because you know, the

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Speaker 2: simple idea that the best schools, libraries, parks, the best

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Speaker 2: parts of town with redlining, all of these things, right,

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Speaker 2: were very much driven with this idea that really white

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Speaker 2: lives were worth more than others and the best things

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Speaker 2: in our communities were to be reserved for their use only.

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Speaker 1: For the best people, the best that's right for the

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Speaker 1: best people.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And it wasn't just a you know, I think

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Speaker 2: the thing that is clear, you know, I'm a religious

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Speaker 2: studies scholar by training, but that these things were not

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Speaker 2: just assertive in philosophical argument, but they were grounded in theology, right,

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Speaker 2: They were really grounded in kind of teachings. And so

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Speaker 2: there's not much of a stronger claim you can make

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Speaker 2: than to say that white people were designed by God

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Speaker 2: to be at the top of the social and political

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Speaker 2: pyramid and everyone else is designated below.

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Speaker 1: That it's the word of God. In that elocution you've

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Speaker 1: written that previous book, White Too Long, about the intersection

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Speaker 1: of race, racism, identity, and Christianity. What led you to

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Speaker 1: this particular book.

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Speaker 2: Well, thanks, You know, it's been a bit of a journey.

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Speaker 2: You know, I grew up very much in the Southern

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Speaker 2: Baptist Evangelical world in the South, so it's been partially

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Speaker 2: a kind of chronicle of my own thinking and wrestling

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Speaker 2: with these issues. You know, the first book I wrote

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Speaker 2: with the word white and the title was actually in

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Speaker 2: twenty sixteen called The End of White Christian America, and

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Speaker 2: it was really trying to wrestle with the demographics in

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Speaker 2: the country and the ways that we had moved from

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Speaker 2: being this majority white Christian country to one that was

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Speaker 2: no longer a majority white Christian country. So trying to

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Speaker 2: look at the demographics and how that was setting off

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Speaker 2: I think a lot of reactions in our culture and

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Speaker 2: our politics. Just to kind of give you the numbers there,

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Speaker 2: you know, recently two thousand and eight, the country was

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Speaker 2: fifty six percent white and Christian, as you put all

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Speaker 2: you know, Protestants, Catholics, non denominational folks all together, a

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Speaker 2: majority white and Christian. By the time Barack Obama gets

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Speaker 2: out office, our first African American president, that numbers dropped

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Speaker 2: to forty seven and today at numbers forty two percent. Well,

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Speaker 2: the country just in a very short amount of time

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Speaker 2: actually has crossed this milestone from being majority white and

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Speaker 2: Christian to won the so longer majority white and Christian.

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Speaker 2: And then the last book, called White Too Long, was

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Speaker 2: really focused on It was part memoir history, memoir, and

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Speaker 2: also kind of social science and attitudes in the country.

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Speaker 2: But looking at really my own families history. My family's

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Speaker 2: longer routes go back into Middle Georgia, six generations there,

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Speaker 2: and so trying to tell the story of my own family.

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Speaker 2: I have a family Bible from eighteen fifteen, you know,

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Speaker 2: that was very valued possession in my family. But also

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Speaker 2: found out that through doing some genealogical research on that

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Speaker 2: family that owned that Bible, that they also enslaved people

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Speaker 2: in Middle Georgia. So this Christian identity and enslaving other

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Speaker 2: people was seen to be completely consistent. And my own denomination,

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Speaker 2: the Southern Baptist Convention, which is actually the largest Protestant

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Speaker 2: denomination in the country still today, was founded in eighteen

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Speaker 2: forty five explicitly to make enslaving other people compatible with

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Speaker 2: the practice of Christianity. All right, and so just kind

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Speaker 2: of getting clear of that book was really trying to

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Speaker 2: get it clear of those roots. But I realized that

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Speaker 2: I really need to take the story back even further.

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Speaker 2: And so this book is trying to really locate where

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Speaker 2: does this come from. What's the kind of near proximate

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Speaker 2: cause to this link between white supremacy and Christianity that

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Speaker 2: really sets the moral compass in many ways in this country.

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Speaker 2: And so I pull it back in this book historically

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Speaker 2: back further. It leads back to fourteen ninety three where

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Speaker 2: this thing called the Doctor of Discovery had emerged and

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Speaker 2: really does again like set the moral compass for Europeans

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Speaker 2: that land on these shores.

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Speaker 1: That's a useful bit of historiography from you. For a

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Speaker 1: couple of reasons. Columbus Day is going to have been

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Speaker 1: celebrated shortly before we air, and that has become a

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Speaker 1: controversial holiday in the United States. It was historically celebrated

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Speaker 1: as a moment of great discovery, the conjoining of Europe

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Speaker 1: with the North American continent, and a door opening up

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Speaker 1: to progress and prosperity. What we now know about Christopher

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Speaker 1: Columbus himself and the introduction of slavery through the Columbian

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Speaker 1: expeditions have provided us with a much more complex and

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Speaker 1: troubling picture of enslavement, expropriation, and mythologies built to justify

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Speaker 1: those things. And I think one of the really useful

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Speaker 1: historical things you do with the book is say, you know,

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Speaker 1: we tend to think about the arrival of African American

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Speaker 1: slaves as the incenting moment around racial mythologies and racial

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Speaker 1: suppression and exploitation of the United States, but in fact it

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Speaker 1: began long before that tell us a little bit about

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Speaker 1: the doctrine of discovery in that context.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, even that move to thinking about including the enslavement

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Speaker 2: of Africans in the kind of colonial history is fairly new, right.

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Speaker 2: We really got that with the sixty nineteen project, which

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Speaker 2: just emerge over the last five years and not uncontroversially

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Speaker 2: a lot of backlash over that, But you're right, I

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Speaker 2: am arguing that we really need to broaden the aperture

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Speaker 2: even more because by the time sixty nineteen arrives, we

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Speaker 2: have more than a century of European interaction with indigenous

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Speaker 2: people in this country. I think we often forget that

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Speaker 2: the history goes back that far, and more importantly, what

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Speaker 2: we have is a kind of moral and theological worldview

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Speaker 2: that develops that guides the way that Europeans more broadly

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Speaker 2: think about people who inhabit these lands. And I think

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Speaker 2: that piece is still very much with us today, rooted

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Speaker 2: in a set of fifteenth century someone arcane papal document

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Speaker 2: that were developed, but they essentially boiled down to this

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Speaker 2: idea that because essentially people were asking, well, what's our

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Speaker 2: moral obligation to these people that we are encountering in

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Speaker 2: these lands, And the theological and moral logic that developed

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Speaker 2: basically came up with this one criteria and the essential

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Speaker 2: question was are they Christian or not? If these people

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Speaker 2: that they are quote unquote discovering were not Christian, then

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Speaker 2: they could be considered, I mean this is the actual

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Speaker 2: word in the document, they could be considered enemies of Christ.

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Speaker 2: And as enemies of Christ, then they were legitimized in

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Speaker 2: occupying those lands, taking possession of the land, stealing their goods.

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Speaker 2: It actually like spells out in these documents that they

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Speaker 2: have permission from the Church to do this. And then

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Speaker 2: this one phrase has always really stayed with me from

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Speaker 2: that set of papal documents actually says and not only

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Speaker 2: those things, but that they have permission to reduce their

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Speaker 2: persons to perpetual slavery and all spelled out. So if

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Speaker 2: you think about the whole Transatlantic slave trade, genocide, dispossession

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Speaker 2: of Native Americans, it's all sort of of a peace

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Speaker 2: with this moral and religious worldview that gets developed, you know,

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Speaker 2: out of the late fourteen hundreds.

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Speaker 1: And very similar to some of the later codes, you know,

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Speaker 1: the white Men's Burden and secular constructs that were used

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Speaker 1: by the British and other European colonial powers to subjugate

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Speaker 1: countries in Africa and populations in Africa in East Asia,

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Speaker 1: and again the idea that you could put conventional morality

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Speaker 1: to the side because you were dealing with the population

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Speaker 1: of people who by definition were opposed to your own

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Speaker 1: moral code, so it didn't matter what you did to them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and the idea was that, you know, the terms

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Speaker 2: that come up over and over again in these documents

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Speaker 2: and even in more popular construls, not just the legal construls,

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Speaker 2: but are the idea that by giving these people again

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Speaker 2: who are seen to be enemies of Christ or savages

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Speaker 2: or pagans, the words that come up are by giving

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Speaker 2: them Christianity and civilization, like those two were to come

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Speaker 2: up all the time, Christianity and civilization, that these were

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Speaker 2: seen to be such enormous goods were being bestowed upon

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Speaker 2: these people that it justified everything else. They lost their land,

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Speaker 2: their lives, their goods, their freedom, their sovereignty, all of

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Speaker 2: that was seen to be justified because giving them the

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Speaker 2: superiority of Christianity and the superiority of European civilization was

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Speaker 2: seen to outweigh all of those losses.

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Speaker 1: I think the other useful thing that you do in

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Speaker 1: analyzing it this way is locate expropriation and racism within

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Speaker 1: the Native American experience, the indigenous peoples of the United States.

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Speaker 1: We have rich historiography around the black experience in the

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Speaker 1: United States, but I think it's less front of mind

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Speaker 1: how the genocide that was visited upon indigenous peoples in

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Speaker 1: the United States and then it preceded this epical slavery

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Speaker 1: period by a meaningful amount of time.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that was something I really got clear about just

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Speaker 2: in the process of doing research for the book. You know,

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Speaker 2: like in my home state of Mississippi, you know, we

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Speaker 2: think about these vast farmlands and then kind of you know,

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Speaker 2: still today it's some of the richest farmland in the world,

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Speaker 2: and the Mississippi Delta and that alluvial floodplain kind of

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Speaker 2: going from Memphis to Vicksburg. But prior to eighteen hundred,

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Speaker 2: those lands were heavily forested swamp land essentially, and now

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Speaker 2: the soil was very rich, but you couldn't get to it.

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Speaker 2: But people realized that that was going to be very

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Speaker 2: rich land. And Europeans basically had two problems. One they

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Speaker 2: were occupied by indigenous people and two they didn't have

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Speaker 2: the labor to clear all that land and then to

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Speaker 2: turn it into farmland and the defarm it. And they

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Speaker 2: solved it really with violence, by killing off many of

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Speaker 2: the original inhabitants of the land by force and by

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Speaker 2: diseases that were spread, and then with force removal. There

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Speaker 2: was actually, you know, a whole period of the actually

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Speaker 2: got called Indian removal. That was the official policy of

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Speaker 2: the United States in the eighteen thirties. That resulted in

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Speaker 2: what became known as the Trail of Tiers, was should

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Speaker 2: be called the Trails of Tears. There were multiple waves

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Speaker 2: of force removals where you know, as many as twenty

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Speaker 2: five thirty percent of the folks died on the way,

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Speaker 2: there were kind of forced marches in the dead of winter,

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Speaker 2: in many cases over hundreds of miles that had to

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Speaker 2: happen first in order for African labor enslave labor to

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Speaker 2: be brought in to clear that land and to turn

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Speaker 2: it into farmland. But again, the thing driving the engine

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Speaker 2: is this idea. It's not that far from many of

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Speaker 2: our device today, but this idea that these lands were

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Speaker 2: intended to be a kind of, you know, divinely ordained

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Speaker 2: promised land for European Christians.

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Speaker 1: So let's bring it a little closer into the present.

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Speaker 1: In your book, you focus on three case studies, as

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Speaker 1: it were, the lynching of three black circus workers in Duluth,

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Speaker 1: Minnesota in nineteen twenty, the Tulsa, Oklahoma massacre which resulted

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Speaker 1: in three hundred deaths in nineteen twenty one, and Emmett

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Speaker 1: Tills murder in nineteen fifty five. What links those three

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Speaker 1: events and why did you group them together in your book?

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Speaker 2: Well, you know, the truth is, I could have written

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Speaker 2: fifty chapters, one for each state that told very similar histories.

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Speaker 2: I wanted to get some kind of different kinds of

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Speaker 2: states that had different stories, So you know, Mississippi is

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Speaker 2: my home state, and wanted to start there for personal reasons.

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Speaker 2: And really this is the more recent story and until murder,

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Speaker 2: torture and murder of course, was the spark, really meaning

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Speaker 2: talk about it as the spark that ignited the modern

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Speaker 2: civil rights movement, So thought that was important. It's also

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Speaker 2: a deep, deep south state. Oklahoma, you know, is essentially

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Speaker 2: its origins are, to put it kind of bluntly, was

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Speaker 2: to be a dumping ground for indigenous refugees that were

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Speaker 2: being pushed off the land all across the southeastern seaboard

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Speaker 2: and forcibly moved there to Oklahoma's has this very peculiar,

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Speaker 2: you know history itself, and then also this history of

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Speaker 2: white racial violence toward African Americans in Tulsa, and then,

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Speaker 2: you know, I didn't want to just pick on southern state.

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Speaker 2: Oklahoma was a very conservative red state as well. Politically

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Speaker 2: it's I think it may be the only state where

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Speaker 2: every county voted for former President Trump in the last election.

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Speaker 2: So I want to go somewhere a little different culturally,

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Speaker 2: and can't get us further north in Minnesota, so good

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Speaker 2: kind of midwestern state hugs Canada pretty far north, and

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Speaker 2: you know, tell the story there. I think by doing that,

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Speaker 2: I think it helps make it clear, as it became

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Speaker 2: clear to me during the research, this is not really

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Speaker 2: a Southern story. It's not just a Red state story.

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Speaker 2: This is really an American story. And again, I think

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Speaker 2: you could tell these stories. There's comparable stories in every

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Speaker 2: state in the country. But by telling it through three

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Speaker 2: different lenses, I think the patterns become fairly clear. You

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Speaker 2: see their echoes of the same kind of treatment of

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Speaker 2: indigenous people, the same kind of treatment of African Americans,

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Speaker 2: and these kind of violent outbursts that happen in all

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Speaker 2: three places.

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Speaker 1: Is the commonality. They're both the combination of violence with

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Speaker 1: myth making and other excuses that justify the use of

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Speaker 1: the violence.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. I mean, you know, there's, first of all,

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Speaker 2: this mythology we've been talking about that the US is

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Speaker 2: of you know, divinely ordained promised land, specifically for people

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Speaker 2: of European descent who are Christian, and so that gets

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Speaker 2: the whole thing off the ground and drives it, you know.

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Speaker 2: But then there are these outbursts of violence to protect

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Speaker 2: that vision and myth making. And then there is you know,

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Speaker 2: in each place there was this process of intentional forgetting

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Speaker 2: of kind of sweeping it all under the rug after

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Speaker 2: these violent events happening, and protecting a kind of myth

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Speaker 2: of innocence that people continue to tell about themselves in

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Speaker 2: each place.

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Speaker 1: Throughout your book, and specifically towards the end, you talk

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Speaker 1: about paths towards healing, and you focus in on reparations

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Speaker 1: as being a very practical and tangible tool for addressing

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Speaker 1: some of the wrongs of the past. It's a controversial policy.

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Speaker 1: The African American community, the Black community the United States

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Speaker 1: supports it wholeheartedly. Hispanics for the most part, don't support it.

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Speaker 1: Asian Americans don't support it. White Americans don't support it,

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Speaker 1: and around half or so of the Democratic Party is

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Speaker 1: ambivalent to disapproving of it. And when I'm speaking of

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Speaker 1: reparations for our listeners, it's simply trying to put a

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Speaker 1: dollar amount on the damage that's been visited on these

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Speaker 1: exppropriated populations. I imagine we will get there soon with

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Speaker 1: Native Americans, but most of the dialogue right now is

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Speaker 1: about the Black community and descendants of armor slaves, the

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Speaker 1: argument being that cutting a check might address some of

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Speaker 1: the economic and social fallout that came from slavery, oppression

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Speaker 1: and expropriation. What do you do, though, Robbie, with the

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Speaker 1: fact that there is such sort of popular mechanical opposition

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Speaker 1: towards using something like reparations as a tool.

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Speaker 2: You're right about the kind of ambivalence in the general

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Speaker 2: American public about this, you know, I think that it

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Speaker 2: is really linked to a real ignorance of our history.

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Speaker 2: You know. I think that that's the link, is that

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Speaker 2: if you ask about reparations in the abstract, people generally

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Speaker 2: know there was slavery. There was, But I think people

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Speaker 2: don't really know the links between slavery, reconstruction, tearing down

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Speaker 2: of reconstruction, the erection of Jim Crow, and just you know,

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Speaker 2: the systematic effort to disenfranchise African Americans even after the

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Speaker 2: abolition of slavery. And I think when you get clearer

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Speaker 2: about that history, the question of reparations becomes less controversial,

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Speaker 2: and I think the resistance to is less. So I

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Speaker 2: really think we're just at the very beginning of a

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Speaker 2: process of truth telling around this history. And in fact,

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Speaker 2: that's why we're seeing so much in the political battles

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Speaker 2: they're over history. What's going to be taught to our

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Speaker 2: kids in school. What isn't, what's appropriate, what's not, what's

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Speaker 2: the real American story, what's not? Like all these kinds

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Speaker 2: of questions, it's because there is this moment of reckoning happening,

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Speaker 2: and that if we fully reckon, I think with the

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Speaker 2: realities of that history, you know, the questions of reparations, repair,

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Speaker 2: repairing the damage, put in theological terms, repentance, those kind

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Speaker 2: of questions become I think, less abstract when you are

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Speaker 2: more grunted in the history. So I think this is

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Speaker 2: going to be an ongoing conversation. But as I see it,

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Speaker 2: you know, if you think about a process of confession

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Speaker 2: and truth telling that leads to repentance and repair, we

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Speaker 2: are only at the very beginning of the confession and

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Speaker 2: truth telling part of that process. And so I think

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Speaker 2: as that goes on, that conversation will will develop, and

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Speaker 2: I think it will need to include, you know, not

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Speaker 2: just African Americans, but indigenous people. It'll need to include

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Speaker 2: you know, we also had like a whole history of

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Speaker 2: Asian American prejudice. I mean, we had an act that

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Speaker 2: was just explicitly called in the nineteen twenties the Chinese

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Speaker 2: Exclusion Act for goodness sake, so you know, we'll need

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Speaker 2: to reckon, I think, with all of that history going forward.

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Speaker 2: But the only other thing I'd say to this is

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Speaker 2: that I think that sometimes people are thinking about this

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Speaker 2: at a very high abstract like national level, but where

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Speaker 2: I've seen things on the ground kind of working is

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Speaker 2: actually at the local level. Right. So a place like Evanston, Illinois,

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Speaker 2: had the history of redlining, and they've actually tried to

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Speaker 2: set up a fund that allows for anyone who could

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Speaker 2: show that they were denied alone in Evanston on basis

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Speaker 2: of race, can then apply now for help with it

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Speaker 2: down payment, help with house payments as a way that

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Speaker 2: the city is trying to reckon with that history. So

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Speaker 2: all of that to say, I think the tighter it's

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Speaker 2: connected to kind of local histories, I think that also

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Speaker 2: helps as well, because then there is a coherent story

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Speaker 2: that people are understanding we're doing this because of these

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Speaker 2: concrete actions in the past.

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Speaker 1: Robbie, on that note, I want to take a quick

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Speaker 1: break so we can hear from a sponsor, and then

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Speaker 1: we'll come right back. We're back with Robbie Jones, author

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Speaker 1: of The Hidden Roots of White supremacy. We were just

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Speaker 1: talking about reparations and its challenges, So let's talk a

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Speaker 1: little bit more about money. You've criticized James Carville, Bill

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Speaker 1: Clinton's well known advisor, for recommending the politicians and policymakers

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Speaker 1: emphasized class over race. Carvill's famous formulation was, it's the

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Speaker 1: economy stupid. And I think your counter argument is, no,

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Speaker 1: it's white supremacy stupid, and it's white racism stupid. And

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Speaker 1: that if we're going to solve some of the divisions

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Speaker 1: we're dealing with now that have come out of the

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Speaker 1: history you and I were discussing earlier in the show,

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Speaker 1: you have to prioritize racism and the mythology surrounding white

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Speaker 1: supremacy to deal with that.

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Speaker 2: Right, Well, you know, is certainly the case that these

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Speaker 2: two things are inter woven in our history. And I

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Speaker 2: don't want to overstate the point. You're right about my

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Speaker 2: criticism of that. I think it does not fully explain

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Speaker 2: the moment we're in, our deeper history, the deeper divides

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Speaker 2: that we're dealing with now. It may have worked as

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Speaker 2: a short term political slogan, but if we're really going

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Speaker 2: to understand for the long term, the train has shifted.

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Speaker 2: We actually did some kind of testing of this and

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Speaker 2: some public opinion survey work. You know, my day job,

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Speaker 2: I wear the present founder of Public Religion Research Institute.

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Speaker 2: We do a lot of public opinion polling, and we

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Speaker 2: partnered with the Atlantic in twenty sixteen and actually tested

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Speaker 2: this out, this idea. So, what's driving the bigger partisan

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Speaker 2: divisions and what was driving specifically support for Donald Trump

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Speaker 2: in twenty sixteen. Was it a kind of economic resentment

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Speaker 2: argument or was it more of a cultural resentment argument

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Speaker 2: around immigrants and whites being discriminated against and those kinds

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Speaker 2: of things. And we basically found no surprise, it's both.

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Speaker 2: So when we put it in a kind of fancy

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Speaker 2: regression model and held a bunch of stuff constant, both

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Speaker 2: of these things turned out to be independent predictors of

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Speaker 2: support for Trump. But the cultural factors, this kind of

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Speaker 2: anti immigrant sentiment, resentment against African Americans, denials of systemic racism,

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Speaker 2: those things were three times as powerful as the economic

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Speaker 2: resentment arguments for support for Trump.

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Speaker 1: As a motivating force for a vote. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: So if you think about this as a recipe, it's

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Speaker 2: three parts kind of racial resentment and one part kind

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Speaker 2: of economic resentment that was kind of driving our grievances

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Speaker 2: that we're driving support.

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Speaker 1: So your lesson from that is your policy prescriptions and

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Speaker 1: your analysis should follow a similar recipe.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I think we're going to get to the

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Speaker 2: root of the problem and not just finesse it. We're

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Speaker 2: really going to have to deal with this head on.

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Speaker 2: And I think the other thing that's changed is the

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Speaker 2: demographics of the country since the nineteen nineties. This is

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Speaker 2: the first generation that has really been had to deal

434
00:22:47,480 --> 00:22:50,359
Speaker 2: with the fact that white Christians country are no longer

435
00:22:50,560 --> 00:22:55,280
Speaker 2: a supermajority. Can't just depend on overwhelming with numbers, right,

436
00:22:55,359 --> 00:22:58,520
Speaker 2: the numbers just aren't there. And so the question of

437
00:22:58,640 --> 00:23:01,440
Speaker 2: are we a pluralistic democracy when even when the outcomes

438
00:23:01,480 --> 00:23:03,280
Speaker 2: may not go our way because we don't have the

439
00:23:03,320 --> 00:23:06,280
Speaker 2: numbers anymore, do we still support democracy? Do we still

440
00:23:06,320 --> 00:23:09,320
Speaker 2: support fair and open election? Those are I think questions

441
00:23:09,320 --> 00:23:11,400
Speaker 2: that are very present for us today in a way

442
00:23:11,400 --> 00:23:13,359
Speaker 2: that they weren't. And that's why I think race and

443
00:23:13,440 --> 00:23:17,399
Speaker 2: ethnicity and these big debates over you know, we're debating

444
00:23:17,480 --> 00:23:20,320
Speaker 2: less about policy today, I think, or I would argue,

445
00:23:20,400 --> 00:23:22,720
Speaker 2: than we are about identity. You know, who gets to

446
00:23:22,760 --> 00:23:25,520
Speaker 2: be an American? Who is America for? Who is this

447
00:23:25,600 --> 00:23:29,800
Speaker 2: country for? And whose belongs and who doesn't. These are

448
00:23:29,800 --> 00:23:32,439
Speaker 2: the bigger dividing lines today, and they're all wrapped up

449
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:34,600
Speaker 2: with these kind of ethno religious claims.

450
00:23:35,400 --> 00:23:39,320
Speaker 1: Also, you know, informed in that conversation often by ethnic

451
00:23:39,359 --> 00:23:44,439
Speaker 1: groups whose ancestors experienced discrimination themselves, whether it was the

452
00:23:44,520 --> 00:23:47,399
Speaker 1: Jews or the Irish or the Italians, who at a

453
00:23:47,560 --> 00:23:51,160
Speaker 1: distant but not so distant point in the past had

454
00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:54,600
Speaker 1: to deal with the very same discrimination that they support now.

455
00:23:54,840 --> 00:23:57,240
Speaker 1: And these random definitions of what does it mean to

456
00:23:57,280 --> 00:24:00,200
Speaker 1: be an American? Let's talk about symbols to that. That's

457
00:24:00,200 --> 00:24:02,920
Speaker 1: another part of your work that I think is powerful

458
00:24:02,960 --> 00:24:06,159
Speaker 1: and important in the conversation we're having, especially given all

459
00:24:06,160 --> 00:24:08,480
Speaker 1: the discussion of what to do with monuments to the

460
00:24:08,480 --> 00:24:13,760
Speaker 1: Confederacy and various statuary and monuments that are sprinkled around

461
00:24:13,760 --> 00:24:18,679
Speaker 1: the country that do enshrine a certain racial hierarchy and

462
00:24:18,720 --> 00:24:22,000
Speaker 1: an oppressive racial order. In the book I mentioned earlier,

463
00:24:22,080 --> 00:24:24,359
Speaker 1: White Too Long, which came out in twenty twenty, I

464
00:24:24,359 --> 00:24:29,800
Speaker 1: believe you mentioned how some Southern churches had stained glass

465
00:24:29,840 --> 00:24:34,360
Speaker 1: windows that had images of Confederate generals. Robert E. Lee

466
00:24:34,440 --> 00:24:38,320
Speaker 1: and Stonewall Jackson embedded into the glass. And that was

467
00:24:38,400 --> 00:24:41,159
Speaker 1: powerful to me because again it was this tangible and

468
00:24:41,400 --> 00:24:47,119
Speaker 1: visible touchstone for what you've been addressing throughout your career,

469
00:24:47,160 --> 00:24:51,800
Speaker 1: which is this intermingling of Christianity, racism, and brute force.

470
00:24:52,600 --> 00:24:55,399
Speaker 1: How do you think about how important this kind of

471
00:24:55,440 --> 00:25:00,280
Speaker 1: symbols and iconography and statuary monuments are in in this

472
00:25:00,359 --> 00:25:03,000
Speaker 1: greater problem of white supremacy and racism.

473
00:25:04,400 --> 00:25:06,800
Speaker 2: Oh thanks for that. No, I think they're hugely important.

474
00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:09,800
Speaker 2: We could sort of argue using words and books and

475
00:25:09,840 --> 00:25:12,240
Speaker 2: those kinds of things. But one of the things that

476
00:25:12,359 --> 00:25:15,080
Speaker 2: after the Civil War, this group called the United Daughters

477
00:25:15,080 --> 00:25:18,920
Speaker 2: of the Confederacy saw very clearly was that one way

478
00:25:18,920 --> 00:25:21,639
Speaker 2: to educate the next generation and to stake their claim

479
00:25:21,680 --> 00:25:25,240
Speaker 2: on their spin on history was to create these monuments

480
00:25:25,280 --> 00:25:29,200
Speaker 2: and to put them in very public spaces a courthouse lawn,

481
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:31,960
Speaker 2: so that when people were going in to have a

482
00:25:32,000 --> 00:25:34,240
Speaker 2: case adjudicated, there was a kind of statement on the

483
00:25:34,320 --> 00:25:37,960
Speaker 2: lawn about whose law who was in charge? Essentially, you

484
00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:40,720
Speaker 2: know still and they were Confederate soldiers often and I

485
00:25:40,720 --> 00:25:42,680
Speaker 2: mean you know here in Virginia near where I live,

486
00:25:43,119 --> 00:25:47,480
Speaker 2: still there is in Orange Virginia. There's Madison's grave, there's

487
00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:50,439
Speaker 2: the courthouse, and there's a huge Confederate monument right on

488
00:25:50,480 --> 00:25:53,080
Speaker 2: the lot of the courthouse, and engraved in there it

489
00:25:53,080 --> 00:25:56,240
Speaker 2: says they died for the right all right ght you know,

490
00:25:56,280 --> 00:25:59,160
Speaker 2: for the right there and this kind of declaration, the

491
00:25:59,200 --> 00:26:02,399
Speaker 2: massive statute Jefferson Davis in Richmond on Monument Avenue in

492
00:26:02,480 --> 00:26:05,040
Speaker 2: Richmond that has now been torn down, but was there,

493
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:07,800
Speaker 2: and it had this big column probably fifty feet high,

494
00:26:08,240 --> 00:26:10,280
Speaker 2: with a gold statue of a woman with her finger

495
00:26:10,320 --> 00:26:12,879
Speaker 2: pointed at the heavens, and under it in Latin it

496
00:26:12,920 --> 00:26:16,160
Speaker 2: said God will vindicate right the Confederacy. So like these

497
00:26:16,160 --> 00:26:18,399
Speaker 2: were things that stood for one hundred years, right, that

498
00:26:18,480 --> 00:26:20,439
Speaker 2: citizens had to drive by every day and kind of

499
00:26:20,560 --> 00:26:23,360
Speaker 2: educated them. So I think these symbols are hugely important.

500
00:26:23,960 --> 00:26:26,960
Speaker 2: This is all very recent history, and I think certainly

501
00:26:26,960 --> 00:26:29,639
Speaker 2: those wanting to kind of uphold the law's cause, you know,

502
00:26:29,680 --> 00:26:31,439
Speaker 2: they had a textbook program, but they also had this

503
00:26:31,520 --> 00:26:34,800
Speaker 2: monument program that they saw is really influential in shaping

504
00:26:35,119 --> 00:26:38,080
Speaker 2: public memory, right, And if that's the history we're telling,

505
00:26:38,200 --> 00:26:40,679
Speaker 2: it shapes how we kind of deal with others in

506
00:26:40,680 --> 00:26:41,119
Speaker 2: the present.

507
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:44,040
Speaker 1: So I assume you think it's a healthy process that

508
00:26:44,080 --> 00:26:46,359
Speaker 1: some of these minings were being taken down or people

509
00:26:46,440 --> 00:26:48,719
Speaker 1: are either looking at them in contacts or getting rid

510
00:26:48,720 --> 00:26:49,200
Speaker 1: of them.

511
00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:51,639
Speaker 2: You know, I do. You know, I'd be straightforward about it.

512
00:26:51,680 --> 00:26:51,840
Speaker 1: You know.

513
00:26:51,840 --> 00:26:53,520
Speaker 2: The one thing that changed my mind. So I grew

514
00:26:53,560 --> 00:26:55,959
Speaker 2: up in Mississippi. I mentioned, and my high school was

515
00:26:56,000 --> 00:26:58,720
Speaker 2: the Our mascot was the Rebels, like we were following

516
00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:02,000
Speaker 2: the University of Mississippi. We had a Confederate colonel as

517
00:27:02,080 --> 00:27:04,600
Speaker 2: the mascot, you know, kind of walk around on the

518
00:27:04,640 --> 00:27:07,200
Speaker 2: football field. The band played Dixie when the football team

519
00:27:07,640 --> 00:27:10,000
Speaker 2: scored a touchdown, and there was a cheerleader that ran

520
00:27:10,080 --> 00:27:12,160
Speaker 2: up and down the sideline with a big Confederate battle flag.

521
00:27:12,200 --> 00:27:14,800
Speaker 2: And it was a public school in Jackson. So I

522
00:27:14,800 --> 00:27:17,760
Speaker 2: come very much out of this world and didn't understand

523
00:27:17,800 --> 00:27:19,560
Speaker 2: like I was one of the people who thought about

524
00:27:19,560 --> 00:27:22,360
Speaker 2: it as it's our heritage, that's what that's about. Right.

525
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:24,159
Speaker 2: People in my family fought on the side of the

526
00:27:24,200 --> 00:27:27,560
Speaker 2: Confederacy in Georgia, and so that's part of my family's history.

527
00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:30,080
Speaker 2: But what I realized is that I think the change

528
00:27:30,080 --> 00:27:32,400
Speaker 2: that really helped me is realized is that the vast

529
00:27:32,440 --> 00:27:35,359
Speaker 2: majority of the Confederate monuments that went up did not

530
00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:38,159
Speaker 2: go up during the Civil War. They did not go

531
00:27:38,280 --> 00:27:40,960
Speaker 2: up even in the years following the Civil War. Most

532
00:27:40,960 --> 00:27:42,840
Speaker 2: of them went up in the nineteen twenties and in

533
00:27:42,880 --> 00:27:45,320
Speaker 2: the nineteen fifties. And once you kind of realize that,

534
00:27:45,359 --> 00:27:47,720
Speaker 2: you're like, oh, well, what's that about. Well, it was

535
00:27:47,760 --> 00:27:50,399
Speaker 2: the re establishment of Jim Crow and the response to

536
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:53,639
Speaker 2: Brown b Board of Education desegregating public schools that just

537
00:27:54,520 --> 00:27:56,720
Speaker 2: led to this flowering of this kind of honoring of

538
00:27:56,760 --> 00:27:59,040
Speaker 2: the Confederacy and this kind of revival of this lost

539
00:27:59,080 --> 00:28:00,000
Speaker 2: cause mythology.

540
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:03,000
Speaker 1: Also, you know, when you mentioned earlier that the football

541
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:04,720
Speaker 1: team was called the rebels, I guess it would be

542
00:28:04,760 --> 00:28:06,520
Speaker 1: too long a term to put on the football helmet

543
00:28:06,720 --> 00:28:11,080
Speaker 1: to call them the domestic terrorists. But you know, a

544
00:28:11,240 --> 00:28:14,840
Speaker 1: language that we use to describe what the Confederate Army

545
00:28:14,960 --> 00:28:19,080
Speaker 1: d You know, they were insurrectionists, they took up arms.

546
00:28:19,359 --> 00:28:23,400
Speaker 1: They meet every classic definition of domestic terrorism. But they've

547
00:28:23,400 --> 00:28:26,240
Speaker 1: been shrouded in this sort of romantic gone with the

548
00:28:26,280 --> 00:28:29,800
Speaker 1: wind pageantry of a noble order that was subjugated by

549
00:28:29,840 --> 00:28:32,280
Speaker 1: the grinding industrial power of the Yankees.

550
00:28:32,800 --> 00:28:34,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, the word that I think flew

551
00:28:34,720 --> 00:28:37,679
Speaker 2: around so much too, was honorable, like that was the

552
00:28:37,760 --> 00:28:39,880
Speaker 2: term right. There was kind of this sense of honor.

553
00:28:40,240 --> 00:28:42,520
Speaker 2: They served with honor right, and you see that on

554
00:28:42,560 --> 00:28:45,040
Speaker 2: all the monuments they died for the right. All that

555
00:28:45,120 --> 00:28:49,960
Speaker 2: stuff is about valorizing that worldview. Again, that was really

556
00:28:50,040 --> 00:28:53,160
Speaker 2: about defending their right to own other human beings on

557
00:28:53,200 --> 00:28:57,080
Speaker 2: the basis of race. Right. And so it's massive dissonance

558
00:28:57,120 --> 00:28:58,880
Speaker 2: to try to hold those two things. You know that

559
00:28:58,880 --> 00:29:01,760
Speaker 2: that's an honorable and by the way way to live.

560
00:29:02,440 --> 00:29:05,080
Speaker 1: Let's also talk, since we're moving through these institutions, how

561
00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:09,400
Speaker 1: this has informed the architecture of the law. There's a

562
00:29:09,480 --> 00:29:11,960
Speaker 1: million different examples we could try to dig into to

563
00:29:12,040 --> 00:29:14,680
Speaker 1: explore that in a kind of tidy podcasting way, and

564
00:29:14,720 --> 00:29:17,640
Speaker 1: I don't want to reduce it to just raw simplicity.

565
00:29:18,160 --> 00:29:22,320
Speaker 1: But one of the recent Supreme Court rulings, Halen versus Raquin,

566
00:29:22,840 --> 00:29:28,120
Speaker 1: involved a decision around whether or not Native American adoptees

567
00:29:28,800 --> 00:29:34,120
Speaker 1: children should be prioritized for Native American families. In other words,

568
00:29:34,120 --> 00:29:38,040
Speaker 1: if Native American families are adopting kids, they have the

569
00:29:38,080 --> 00:29:40,600
Speaker 1: first right to get in and try to have those

570
00:29:40,680 --> 00:29:42,760
Speaker 1: children in their home. And there was a challenge of

571
00:29:42,840 --> 00:29:45,880
Speaker 1: that law, saying it shouldn't exist, and the Supreme Court,

572
00:29:45,960 --> 00:29:48,800
Speaker 1: in a seven to two decision said no, the law

573
00:29:48,800 --> 00:29:51,840
Speaker 1: should exist. It serves a good social purpose. But you

574
00:29:52,000 --> 00:29:53,360
Speaker 1: probably can see where I'm going to go with this.

575
00:29:53,440 --> 00:29:57,120
Speaker 1: I was very interest in Samuel Alito's descent, in which

576
00:29:57,160 --> 00:29:59,920
Speaker 1: he described the reason for his dissent as essentially this

577
00:30:00,240 --> 00:30:04,920
Speaker 1: arbitrary way of giving one group of people a preferential

578
00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:09,280
Speaker 1: ethnic status that they didn't necessarily deserve. And then in

579
00:30:09,440 --> 00:30:14,400
Speaker 1: I think during oral arguments, he also mentioned that besides,

580
00:30:14,760 --> 00:30:17,360
Speaker 1: when the Europeans came to the United States, this was

581
00:30:17,400 --> 00:30:21,320
Speaker 1: a very warlike culture, and the Europeans essentially did a

582
00:30:21,360 --> 00:30:25,960
Speaker 1: great service in suppressing these savages, and they weren't really

583
00:30:26,000 --> 00:30:28,520
Speaker 1: a community. They lived on very different sides of the country,

584
00:30:28,800 --> 00:30:30,960
Speaker 1: and on and on. And it was very revealing because

585
00:30:31,000 --> 00:30:34,200
Speaker 1: I think Alito, in a number of his judicial decisions,

586
00:30:34,680 --> 00:30:38,720
Speaker 1: cherry picks history, rewrites history, and then uses it to

587
00:30:38,760 --> 00:30:41,479
Speaker 1: define the law and his view of the law. And

588
00:30:41,560 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 1: in the context of the law being such an important

589
00:30:45,280 --> 00:30:48,280
Speaker 1: set of swim lanes around how we can live civilly together,

590
00:30:48,880 --> 00:30:51,640
Speaker 1: the vestiges of white racism aren't far from that either,

591
00:30:51,680 --> 00:30:53,520
Speaker 1: are they now that's right.

592
00:30:53,720 --> 00:30:57,800
Speaker 2: It also is just shockingly ignorant of the history, particularly

593
00:30:57,840 --> 00:31:01,320
Speaker 2: between the US government and indigenous peace people this country.

594
00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:04,040
Speaker 2: To sort of argue that they shouldn't get special treatment

595
00:31:04,440 --> 00:31:06,720
Speaker 2: flies in the face of the way that the United

596
00:31:06,760 --> 00:31:09,720
Speaker 2: States has dealt with indigenous people from the beginning, that is,

597
00:31:09,800 --> 00:31:14,120
Speaker 2: as sovereign nations, right, and then later as dependent peoples

598
00:31:14,160 --> 00:31:17,880
Speaker 2: inside the United States. But nonetheless it's always been absolutely

599
00:31:17,880 --> 00:31:21,640
Speaker 2: they get special treatment because of their special historical status

600
00:31:21,680 --> 00:31:24,800
Speaker 2: and relationship with the US. So to even complain that

601
00:31:24,800 --> 00:31:27,600
Speaker 2: that's a thing, I think is shockingly ignorant of the

602
00:31:27,680 --> 00:31:31,520
Speaker 2: history here. Gorsich's opinion on this case is interesting to me.

603
00:31:32,240 --> 00:31:37,520
Speaker 2: He's staunchly pro indigenous sovereignty and really understands this connection here.

604
00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:39,360
Speaker 2: But you know, again, if we just kind of see

605
00:31:39,400 --> 00:31:40,960
Speaker 2: the history where they.

606
00:31:40,880 --> 00:31:42,360
Speaker 1: Don't want to stop you on that for one minute,

607
00:31:42,400 --> 00:31:45,280
Speaker 1: you know, one of the reasons that Gorstch understands it

608
00:31:45,320 --> 00:31:47,920
Speaker 1: is because it's part of his lived experience. Yeah, you know,

609
00:31:47,960 --> 00:31:50,040
Speaker 1: he grew up around some of this, he had direct

610
00:31:50,080 --> 00:31:53,640
Speaker 1: contact with it. That kind of humility and recollection of

611
00:31:53,640 --> 00:31:57,760
Speaker 1: one's own lived experience as opposed to your academic or

612
00:31:57,840 --> 00:32:01,080
Speaker 1: legal theories could inform more of what the court does.

613
00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:04,000
Speaker 1: And I think that it is an argument as well

614
00:32:04,280 --> 00:32:07,240
Speaker 1: for the thesis of your book that only by reckoning

615
00:32:07,280 --> 00:32:09,680
Speaker 1: with our history and trying to live in that experience

616
00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:12,560
Speaker 1: through history, can we fully understand what the best policies

617
00:32:12,560 --> 00:32:13,960
Speaker 1: are or the best laws.

618
00:32:14,520 --> 00:32:17,200
Speaker 2: I think that's exactly right, you know, and it's refreshing

619
00:32:17,240 --> 00:32:21,120
Speaker 2: to see it not just fall completely along ideological lines

620
00:32:21,200 --> 00:32:23,040
Speaker 2: here that you've got actually corpse that taking in a

621
00:32:23,080 --> 00:32:26,280
Speaker 2: very different tact than Aledo on indigenous cases here. But

622
00:32:26,880 --> 00:32:28,960
Speaker 2: the reason for that law in the first place is

623
00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:32,400
Speaker 2: because there was an over attempt really in kind of

624
00:32:32,400 --> 00:32:36,520
Speaker 2: the United States posture toward indigenous tribes developed over time.

625
00:32:37,680 --> 00:32:40,120
Speaker 2: You know, it was first put people on reservations, but

626
00:32:40,200 --> 00:32:43,200
Speaker 2: it was then this kind of process though, destroy their culture,

627
00:32:43,800 --> 00:32:46,640
Speaker 2: destroy family units, send children off to boarding schools. Many

628
00:32:46,720 --> 00:32:50,240
Speaker 2: children were stripped of their kind of tribal identity and

629
00:32:50,280 --> 00:32:53,440
Speaker 2: putting boarding schools where their hair was cut, they're putting

630
00:32:53,720 --> 00:32:57,360
Speaker 2: European clothes, beaten if they spoke their native languages, et cetera.

631
00:32:57,800 --> 00:33:00,800
Speaker 2: And so those adoption laws were actually passed in the

632
00:33:00,800 --> 00:33:03,800
Speaker 2: wake of that kind of cultural genocide that had been

633
00:33:03,800 --> 00:33:07,480
Speaker 2: meted out and trying to protect the integrity of Indigenous families.

634
00:33:07,480 --> 00:33:09,520
Speaker 2: And so again, if you don't know that history, you

635
00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:12,400
Speaker 2: could try to make some abstract arguments about they got

636
00:33:12,440 --> 00:33:14,320
Speaker 2: to be treated the same as everybody else, but that's

637
00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:17,520
Speaker 2: clearly not the case, either from a legal and kind

638
00:33:17,520 --> 00:33:21,240
Speaker 2: of treaty obligation standpoint or from the kind of cultural history.

639
00:33:22,080 --> 00:33:25,040
Speaker 1: And lastly, before we take another break in this tour

640
00:33:25,080 --> 00:33:28,640
Speaker 1: we're taking through American institutions and racism, let's talk about

641
00:33:28,640 --> 00:33:30,920
Speaker 1: the corporate world and businesses. We're in the middle of

642
00:33:30,960 --> 00:33:35,120
Speaker 1: the woke backlash against corporate leaders trying to take a

643
00:33:35,160 --> 00:33:38,880
Speaker 1: more ecumenical and open minded approach to how to recruit

644
00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:42,240
Speaker 1: and elevate members of their own workforces. The role companies

645
00:33:42,240 --> 00:33:45,360
Speaker 1: and businesses play in society. How much do you think

646
00:33:45,400 --> 00:33:48,560
Speaker 1: that the business and corporate life in the United States

647
00:33:48,960 --> 00:33:55,920
Speaker 1: has also been both informed and defined by white racism.

648
00:33:55,960 --> 00:33:59,120
Speaker 2: Well, you know, clearly heavily structured. You know, if we

649
00:33:59,200 --> 00:34:01,760
Speaker 2: go back to the middle the twentieth century, and not

650
00:34:01,880 --> 00:34:04,320
Speaker 2: that far back, if you were the head of a

651
00:34:04,360 --> 00:34:07,200
Speaker 2: fortune five hundred company, chances are you were white, you

652
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:10,920
Speaker 2: were male, you were Christian and probably Protestant, not Catholic

653
00:34:10,960 --> 00:34:13,480
Speaker 2: or Jewish. You know, the rotary clubs were filled with

654
00:34:13,560 --> 00:34:17,279
Speaker 2: white Anglo Saxon Protestants. Country clubs, for example, where a

655
00:34:17,360 --> 00:34:19,359
Speaker 2: lot of business deals get cut right on the golf

656
00:34:19,400 --> 00:34:22,600
Speaker 2: courses and mingling at the club after. You know, eighteen

657
00:34:22,640 --> 00:34:27,680
Speaker 2: Holes explicitly excluded African Americans, but also Jews and Catholics

658
00:34:27,880 --> 00:34:31,400
Speaker 2: from those institutions. So even at a cultural level, you know,

659
00:34:31,400 --> 00:34:33,480
Speaker 2: it's been a deep, deep part of the structure of

660
00:34:33,480 --> 00:34:36,399
Speaker 2: corporate America. But I do think what we have seen

661
00:34:36,680 --> 00:34:42,000
Speaker 2: is corporations really leaning in to pluralism, to diversity. But

662
00:34:42,080 --> 00:34:44,759
Speaker 2: you know, they're leaning in because they read the demographics

663
00:34:44,760 --> 00:34:47,239
Speaker 2: of the country. So it's part the right thing to do,

664
00:34:47,320 --> 00:34:49,440
Speaker 2: but it's also a very pragmatic thing to do if

665
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:52,680
Speaker 2: they really want to appeal to the rising you know workforce.

666
00:34:52,840 --> 00:34:56,160
Speaker 2: You know, we're still another decade or so away from

667
00:34:56,239 --> 00:34:58,800
Speaker 2: the country being majority non white, even though we've already

668
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:01,640
Speaker 2: passed a point where country no longer majority white and Christian,

669
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:04,440
Speaker 2: but that's on the horizon. And if you're looking at

670
00:35:04,520 --> 00:35:07,719
Speaker 2: high schools today is a majority non white. So corporations

671
00:35:07,760 --> 00:35:11,000
Speaker 2: looking at their next generation of you know, workforce and

672
00:35:11,080 --> 00:35:14,080
Speaker 2: markets Frankly, they've really got to take this into account.

673
00:35:14,160 --> 00:35:16,400
Speaker 2: And I think what we're seeing though, is a backlash

674
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:19,960
Speaker 2: against that movement again from this group, mostly white and

675
00:35:20,040 --> 00:35:22,520
Speaker 2: Christian folks who are used to being, you know, at

676
00:35:22,520 --> 00:35:23,200
Speaker 2: the center.

677
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:26,000
Speaker 1: Of all of this, and it mirrors the political backlash,

678
00:35:26,239 --> 00:35:27,480
Speaker 1: the electoral backlash.

679
00:35:27,719 --> 00:35:29,280
Speaker 2: Yep, that's right, Robbie.

680
00:35:29,280 --> 00:35:31,040
Speaker 1: I want to take another break and then we'll come

681
00:35:31,120 --> 00:35:38,279
Speaker 1: right back up and pick this conversation up again. I'm

682
00:35:38,280 --> 00:35:41,759
Speaker 1: back with Robbie Jones, historian and political analyst. We've been

683
00:35:41,800 --> 00:35:44,840
Speaker 1: talking about the deep roots of racism in American life.

684
00:35:45,520 --> 00:35:49,000
Speaker 1: So let's look ahead, Robbie. Racism and racial violence are

685
00:35:49,239 --> 00:35:51,960
Speaker 1: animating forces right now in American life. I think it's

686
00:35:52,080 --> 00:35:55,480
Speaker 1: very stark. I think people are I'm going to say

687
00:35:55,480 --> 00:35:57,120
Speaker 1: they're surprised to see it, though I don't think they

688
00:35:57,120 --> 00:35:59,640
Speaker 1: should be. But I think that the Trump era has

689
00:35:59,680 --> 00:36:02,080
Speaker 1: pulled the band aid back on some of the myths

690
00:36:02,120 --> 00:36:06,640
Speaker 1: we've told ourselves about racial progress and tolerance. How do

691
00:36:06,680 --> 00:36:10,759
Speaker 1: you see this playing out as you look ahead over

692
00:36:10,800 --> 00:36:14,400
Speaker 1: the next few years. The deep roots of white supremacy

693
00:36:14,440 --> 00:36:17,719
Speaker 1: that you've analyzed so lushly, and then just the realities

694
00:36:17,760 --> 00:36:20,000
Speaker 1: of how it exists in our daily life, which we've

695
00:36:20,040 --> 00:36:21,319
Speaker 1: just been talking about.

696
00:36:21,719 --> 00:36:23,040
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I do think it's important to just

697
00:36:23,080 --> 00:36:25,640
Speaker 2: point to the context. Again. We did have, you know,

698
00:36:25,719 --> 00:36:30,480
Speaker 2: the confluence of the election of our first African American president,

699
00:36:30,719 --> 00:36:33,759
Speaker 2: and I think importantly his re election as well, because

700
00:36:33,760 --> 00:36:36,480
Speaker 2: I think many folks can conserve the white Christians maya

701
00:36:36,520 --> 00:36:38,400
Speaker 2: thought that his election was something of a fluke, but

702
00:36:38,440 --> 00:36:40,839
Speaker 2: then like when he was re elected in twenty twelve,

703
00:36:40,880 --> 00:36:43,040
Speaker 2: I think that was a sign that something had clearly

704
00:36:43,080 --> 00:36:46,279
Speaker 2: shifted in the culture. So we have that event, and

705
00:36:46,320 --> 00:36:48,000
Speaker 2: then it does happen at the same time that we

706
00:36:48,080 --> 00:36:50,360
Speaker 2: move from being majority white Christian country that wants no

707
00:36:50,440 --> 00:36:52,840
Speaker 2: longer majority white Christian country. So I think that's a

708
00:36:52,920 --> 00:36:55,080
Speaker 2: kind of perfect storm in many ways to kind of

709
00:36:55,080 --> 00:36:58,480
Speaker 2: set off a cultural backlash, a big symbolic figure like

710
00:36:58,520 --> 00:37:01,960
Speaker 2: Barack Obama, a coupled demographic change at the same time,

711
00:37:02,360 --> 00:37:04,360
Speaker 2: you know, and then at the local level, like seeing

712
00:37:04,400 --> 00:37:08,360
Speaker 2: things like Spanish language billboards and Spanish language radio stations

713
00:37:08,440 --> 00:37:11,200
Speaker 2: and going to the grocery store and seeing a whole

714
00:37:11,200 --> 00:37:13,640
Speaker 2: ethnic food rial that wasn't there ten years ago, Like

715
00:37:13,680 --> 00:37:15,640
Speaker 2: there are all these kind of signs that the country

716
00:37:16,080 --> 00:37:18,279
Speaker 2: is really shifting, and I think that that has like

717
00:37:18,400 --> 00:37:21,120
Speaker 2: set off this kind of context. And that's the stage

718
00:37:21,120 --> 00:37:23,680
Speaker 2: actually that Donald Trump walked onto, right. He didn't create

719
00:37:23,719 --> 00:37:26,799
Speaker 2: those dynamics, but he walked onto that stage. You know,

720
00:37:26,840 --> 00:37:28,759
Speaker 2: he had props that were pretty well set for him,

721
00:37:29,040 --> 00:37:32,359
Speaker 2: a set that was constructed, but he skillfully was able

722
00:37:32,400 --> 00:37:35,279
Speaker 2: to use that. I think particularly the make America Great

723
00:37:35,280 --> 00:37:37,920
Speaker 2: Again slogan. You know, I've argued that the most important

724
00:37:37,920 --> 00:37:40,480
Speaker 2: word in that is the last one. It's the again.

725
00:37:40,520 --> 00:37:44,080
Speaker 2: It's the nostalgia for taking the country back right to

726
00:37:44,160 --> 00:37:46,359
Speaker 2: a time really when it was a kind of white

727
00:37:46,400 --> 00:37:49,400
Speaker 2: Christian country. And so I think I look forward, I

728
00:37:49,400 --> 00:37:51,640
Speaker 2: do still feel like this is one of the biggest

729
00:37:51,719 --> 00:37:55,880
Speaker 2: dividing lines, kind of two very different and diametrically opposed

730
00:37:55,960 --> 00:37:59,160
Speaker 2: visions of the country. Who the country's for, who belongs

731
00:37:59,200 --> 00:38:03,720
Speaker 2: those big questions. Is the country a divinely ordained promised

732
00:38:03,800 --> 00:38:08,160
Speaker 2: land for European Christians or is the country a pluralistic

733
00:38:08,160 --> 00:38:11,440
Speaker 2: democracy where everybody, regardless of race or ethnicity or religion,

734
00:38:11,480 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 2: stands on equal footing before the constitution. And these are

735
00:38:15,120 --> 00:38:18,040
Speaker 2: big questions we've never fully answered in this country. And

736
00:38:18,040 --> 00:38:20,319
Speaker 2: that's why we're still here because we really never fully

737
00:38:20,360 --> 00:38:23,160
Speaker 2: answered that question, and because the country is changing, it's

738
00:38:23,200 --> 00:38:25,640
Speaker 2: really forcing the conversation out into the open in a

739
00:38:25,640 --> 00:38:27,840
Speaker 2: way that I think it's tried to be finessed in

740
00:38:27,880 --> 00:38:29,960
Speaker 2: the past, but we're really going to have to wrestle

741
00:38:30,400 --> 00:38:32,759
Speaker 2: with this. So looking ahead, I do think the next

742
00:38:32,840 --> 00:38:35,400
Speaker 2: year could be pretty challenging because we're going to have

743
00:38:35,400 --> 00:38:39,239
Speaker 2: the big partisan machines revved up. And today our two

744
00:38:39,280 --> 00:38:43,520
Speaker 2: parties are increasingly divided along ethno religious lines. The Republican

745
00:38:43,560 --> 00:38:47,319
Speaker 2: Party self identified Republicans today are seventy percent white and

746
00:38:47,400 --> 00:38:50,080
Speaker 2: Christian in a country again this forty two percent white

747
00:38:50,080 --> 00:38:53,319
Speaker 2: and Christian. The Democratic Party self identified Democrats are only

748
00:38:53,360 --> 00:38:55,759
Speaker 2: twenty five percent white and Christians. So you have this

749
00:38:55,880 --> 00:38:59,200
Speaker 2: kind of race religion party all kind of pulling in

750
00:38:59,239 --> 00:39:02,400
Speaker 2: the same direction. And we know from survey work that

751
00:39:02,400 --> 00:39:04,680
Speaker 2: the pr I did with Brookings last year. You know,

752
00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:06,839
Speaker 2: it's about thirty percent of the country that believes that

753
00:39:06,920 --> 00:39:10,000
Speaker 2: former image that the country has a divinely ordained promised

754
00:39:10,040 --> 00:39:12,920
Speaker 2: land for European Christians. About three and ten Americans believe that,

755
00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:16,399
Speaker 2: but it's a majority of Republicans that believe that right,

756
00:39:16,400 --> 00:39:18,239
Speaker 2: And so that's a battle line that's going to be

757
00:39:18,320 --> 00:39:21,359
Speaker 2: fought out here with all of the resources that the

758
00:39:21,360 --> 00:39:23,960
Speaker 2: party apparatus has over the next thing. The other thing

759
00:39:24,000 --> 00:39:26,960
Speaker 2: we know is that folks who believe that view of

760
00:39:27,000 --> 00:39:30,000
Speaker 2: America as a kind of divinely ordained promised land are

761
00:39:30,040 --> 00:39:32,840
Speaker 2: four times as likely to support political violence to defend it.

762
00:39:33,320 --> 00:39:34,560
Speaker 2: And so I think that's going to be a real

763
00:39:34,640 --> 00:39:37,479
Speaker 2: challenge as we look ahead this year. The longer view,

764
00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:39,520
Speaker 2: I'm more hopeful, and I think if we stay off

765
00:39:39,560 --> 00:39:41,880
Speaker 2: of the kind of big national frame and we look

766
00:39:41,920 --> 00:39:44,720
Speaker 2: at what's happening in local communities, like the National Cathedral

767
00:39:44,840 --> 00:39:47,960
Speaker 2: changing its windows, like what's happening in the Delta with

768
00:39:48,239 --> 00:39:51,080
Speaker 2: retelling the story of them at til what's happening in Duluth,

769
00:39:51,080 --> 00:39:54,680
Speaker 2: what's happening in Tulsa, commemorating the Tulsa Race massacre. These

770
00:39:54,680 --> 00:39:57,640
Speaker 2: things on the local level, the tearing down of Confederate

771
00:39:57,680 --> 00:40:00,040
Speaker 2: monuments in Richmond do tell me that the win and

772
00:40:00,280 --> 00:40:03,520
Speaker 2: is kind of blowing toward pluralism and democracy. So I

773
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:06,040
Speaker 2: think the longer term outlook for me is I'm more

774
00:40:06,080 --> 00:40:09,280
Speaker 2: hopeful about it. I'm pretty concerned about the next twelve

775
00:40:09,280 --> 00:40:10,240
Speaker 2: to fifteen months.

776
00:40:10,560 --> 00:40:12,880
Speaker 1: When you were talking about Trump earlier, you mentioned make

777
00:40:12,920 --> 00:40:15,640
Speaker 1: America Great Again as one of his pre eminent slogans,

778
00:40:15,640 --> 00:40:18,800
Speaker 1: which it was, but let's not forget that before he

779
00:40:18,920 --> 00:40:21,640
Speaker 1: ran for president in twenty sixteen, he went to school

780
00:40:21,960 --> 00:40:27,120
Speaker 1: as a birther and that's voting Birtherism avidly to undermine

781
00:40:27,320 --> 00:40:31,719
Speaker 1: Barack Obama, Barack Obama's legitimacy as a president, Barack Obama's

782
00:40:31,800 --> 00:40:35,319
Speaker 1: legitimacy as an American as a human being. Any sort

783
00:40:35,320 --> 00:40:39,160
Speaker 1: of road tested I think during that period, the themes,

784
00:40:39,200 --> 00:40:42,399
Speaker 1: the emotions, the talking points that he then walked down

785
00:40:42,440 --> 00:40:45,640
Speaker 1: to the national stage in twenty sixteen and then wedded

786
00:40:45,719 --> 00:40:48,080
Speaker 1: all of that to this Carnia act he had engaged

787
00:40:48,120 --> 00:40:50,760
Speaker 1: in for previous decades as a casino owner.

788
00:40:50,840 --> 00:40:53,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's notable with Obama, he went after him both

789
00:40:53,080 --> 00:40:57,040
Speaker 2: on race and religion. Yeah, it wasn't just about not

790
00:40:57,080 --> 00:40:59,360
Speaker 2: being ableable to run for president not being born in

791
00:40:59,360 --> 00:41:02,080
Speaker 2: the country, but it was about being a Muslim right

792
00:41:02,120 --> 00:41:04,360
Speaker 2: as well. So it was kind of this two pronged

793
00:41:04,400 --> 00:41:06,239
Speaker 2: attack that he was kind of testing out there.

794
00:41:06,800 --> 00:41:08,640
Speaker 1: And you know, one of the other realities of Donald

795
00:41:08,640 --> 00:41:12,000
Speaker 1: Trump is when asked about the various white national groups

796
00:41:12,040 --> 00:41:15,719
Speaker 1: who have been either on the periphery of his candidacy

797
00:41:15,760 --> 00:41:19,480
Speaker 1: and his administration or his public persona and his speechmaking.

798
00:41:19,920 --> 00:41:22,400
Speaker 1: He's never really disavowed them. He was given a chance

799
00:41:22,840 --> 00:41:25,919
Speaker 1: with David Duke at one point to disavow David Duke,

800
00:41:25,960 --> 00:41:29,080
Speaker 1: the former leader of the KKK, and Trump just couldn't

801
00:41:29,120 --> 00:41:32,400
Speaker 1: bring himself to do it. And in more recent iterations

802
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:36,319
Speaker 1: both with the Proud Boys and the Oathkeepers, and we

803
00:41:36,320 --> 00:41:38,400
Speaker 1: could probably go down a whole long road on Donald

804
00:41:38,400 --> 00:41:40,759
Speaker 1: Trump and racism. I'm going to avoid that for the

805
00:41:40,800 --> 00:41:43,520
Speaker 1: efficiency of this conversation. But one of the things I

806
00:41:43,560 --> 00:41:46,200
Speaker 1: thought about in that is that, you know, the KKK

807
00:41:46,440 --> 00:41:51,000
Speaker 1: is a certain kind of white supremacist organization. They're scary,

808
00:41:51,040 --> 00:41:54,160
Speaker 1: they're dark. They actually in the past were actively involved

809
00:41:54,160 --> 00:41:57,240
Speaker 1: in lynchings and then became in the post lynching era.

810
00:41:57,560 --> 00:41:59,440
Speaker 1: I don't know what you would call them, a social

811
00:41:59,520 --> 00:42:02,280
Speaker 1: organization for people to air their grievances, but they weren't

812
00:42:02,719 --> 00:42:07,279
Speaker 1: openly violent. The Proud Boys and the Oathkeepers were all

813
00:42:07,320 --> 00:42:11,239
Speaker 1: around the January sixth insurrection, and I think some of

814
00:42:11,280 --> 00:42:13,520
Speaker 1: their former members stated that they thought it would incent

815
00:42:13,560 --> 00:42:15,600
Speaker 1: to civil war, that they thought it was time to

816
00:42:15,640 --> 00:42:19,359
Speaker 1: actually use violence overturn the election results, and of course,

817
00:42:19,400 --> 00:42:21,880
Speaker 1: because it was this particular group saying it, it was

818
00:42:21,920 --> 00:42:25,720
Speaker 1: to overturn election results in the interests of preserving white power.

819
00:42:26,360 --> 00:42:31,560
Speaker 1: Do you see change organizationally as well in recent years

820
00:42:31,640 --> 00:42:35,640
Speaker 1: or decades in terms of how white supremacy is getting

821
00:42:36,360 --> 00:42:39,480
Speaker 1: both organized and then weaponized.

822
00:42:40,520 --> 00:42:43,320
Speaker 2: You know, I do you know there's a famously Atwater

823
00:42:43,400 --> 00:42:45,600
Speaker 2: quote where he says, you know, you can't use the

824
00:42:45,719 --> 00:42:48,600
Speaker 2: N word anymore to motivate voters, but you can talk

825
00:42:48,640 --> 00:42:51,400
Speaker 2: about bussing, right, So you kind of find these euphemisms

826
00:42:51,440 --> 00:42:53,640
Speaker 2: for talking about it. There's certainly still some of that

827
00:42:53,640 --> 00:42:55,520
Speaker 2: that goes on, but I think it's becoming more and

828
00:42:55,600 --> 00:43:00,000
Speaker 2: more direct, talking about immigrants as rapists and criminals, straightforwardly

829
00:43:00,120 --> 00:43:02,759
Speaker 2: demonizing kind of whole people groups, and even when they're

830
00:43:02,800 --> 00:43:07,120
Speaker 2: clearly white supremacist groups, saying things like they're fine people

831
00:43:07,160 --> 00:43:07,920
Speaker 2: on both sides.

832
00:43:08,360 --> 00:43:11,440
Speaker 1: Right at Charlesville, Yeah, Trump who also said, you know,

833
00:43:11,440 --> 00:43:15,080
Speaker 1: when we ranted about immigrants at their rapists, their murderers,

834
00:43:15,080 --> 00:43:16,240
Speaker 1: but some of them are nice people.

835
00:43:16,440 --> 00:43:19,040
Speaker 2: Yeah. Right. But there's not only not a disavowal by

836
00:43:19,280 --> 00:43:22,360
Speaker 2: one candidate, but there's not a disavowal by the party.

837
00:43:22,880 --> 00:43:25,040
Speaker 2: I think that is really significant, right that he was

838
00:43:25,080 --> 00:43:27,719
Speaker 2: never punished inside the party.

839
00:43:27,719 --> 00:43:31,080
Speaker 1: For for him ultimately, And I think.

840
00:43:30,920 --> 00:43:33,719
Speaker 2: That's something that's new. It's sort of giving that permission

841
00:43:34,360 --> 00:43:36,040
Speaker 2: for as long as the candidate is winning and has

842
00:43:36,080 --> 00:43:39,120
Speaker 2: public supports polling well, to not have that be a

843
00:43:39,120 --> 00:43:43,080
Speaker 2: disqualifying thing to happen over and over again, not just once,

844
00:43:43,160 --> 00:43:46,440
Speaker 2: but multiple times. It became pretty clear. So I think

845
00:43:46,480 --> 00:43:49,920
Speaker 2: that's something fairly new in our recent history and the

846
00:43:49,960 --> 00:43:52,520
Speaker 2: kind of politics of white grievance. I think coming to

847
00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:55,600
Speaker 2: the fore and not really being masked or using euphemisms,

848
00:43:55,600 --> 00:43:58,280
Speaker 2: but just straightforward to out there. I think it's something

849
00:43:58,320 --> 00:43:59,560
Speaker 2: you new that we're contending with.

850
00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:02,640
Speaker 1: One of the things you've taught me through your writing

851
00:44:02,719 --> 00:44:04,600
Speaker 1: that was really helpful to me is I used to

852
00:44:04,600 --> 00:44:09,920
Speaker 1: be more mystified by this collision between Christian values and racism.

853
00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:13,520
Speaker 1: It's overtly hypocritical. I grew up a Catholic. I'm a

854
00:44:13,600 --> 00:44:16,840
Speaker 1: laxed Catholic. I don't practice any religion, but I believe

855
00:44:16,920 --> 00:44:21,400
Speaker 1: deeply in Christian tenets, love and forgiveness as a useful

856
00:44:21,400 --> 00:44:25,680
Speaker 1: philosophic approach to our fellow human beings. And I believe

857
00:44:25,719 --> 00:44:30,719
Speaker 1: that if you then embrace Christianity and Christian values, it

858
00:44:30,760 --> 00:44:35,279
Speaker 1: should preclude racism and certainly should preclude violence. And I

859
00:44:35,320 --> 00:44:38,319
Speaker 1: think what your work has taught me is actually that

860
00:44:38,400 --> 00:44:40,640
Speaker 1: the racism and the violence are part of the mix,

861
00:44:41,200 --> 00:44:43,560
Speaker 1: that they were never a separate thing, That it's not

862
00:44:43,600 --> 00:44:45,160
Speaker 1: a thing to be denied, it's actually a thing to

863
00:44:45,160 --> 00:44:50,080
Speaker 1: be embraced. Because Southern white Christianity was built on the

864
00:44:50,160 --> 00:44:55,040
Speaker 1: back of racial dominance, that raises another question for me

865
00:44:55,080 --> 00:44:58,160
Speaker 1: is what's the way out? These are very deep seated

866
00:44:58,239 --> 00:45:01,200
Speaker 1: things that the political process is and solving it's actually

867
00:45:01,640 --> 00:45:04,879
Speaker 1: bringing to a boiling point. You mentioned earlier that corporations

868
00:45:04,880 --> 00:45:07,560
Speaker 1: are really have been adroit in trying to address it.

869
00:45:07,600 --> 00:45:11,560
Speaker 1: But corporations and businesses and families can often move more

870
00:45:11,640 --> 00:45:14,839
Speaker 1: quickly than political institutions. And the battle we're having right

871
00:45:14,880 --> 00:45:18,120
Speaker 1: now is over our political institutions, because they will shape

872
00:45:18,120 --> 00:45:22,320
Speaker 1: our laws and our regulations and our I think public safety.

873
00:45:22,560 --> 00:45:25,960
Speaker 1: And so what's the way out of that mess?

874
00:45:26,719 --> 00:45:28,920
Speaker 2: Well? I don't have a grand ten point plan. If

875
00:45:28,920 --> 00:45:31,200
Speaker 2: I did, you know, everyone should be suspicious of it anyway.

876
00:45:31,239 --> 00:45:33,759
Speaker 2: But what I have seen though, is and I learned this,

877
00:45:33,840 --> 00:45:36,040
Speaker 2: I think just from being on the ground, I have

878
00:45:36,120 --> 00:45:38,839
Speaker 2: some hope in what local communities are doing. I mean

879
00:45:38,880 --> 00:45:42,880
Speaker 2: in Mississippi, right, these were not wealthy people with postgraduate degrees.

880
00:45:42,920 --> 00:45:46,680
Speaker 2: I mean in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi is fairly poor, rural county.

881
00:45:47,080 --> 00:45:50,480
Speaker 2: And yet the descendants of sharecroppers and enslaved people and

882
00:45:50,520 --> 00:45:53,719
Speaker 2: the descendants of enslavers decided to get together and tell

883
00:45:53,760 --> 00:45:56,000
Speaker 2: the truth about what had happened in Mattel, try to

884
00:45:56,040 --> 00:45:59,200
Speaker 2: tell more truthful accounting of how they got to where

885
00:45:59,200 --> 00:46:02,280
Speaker 2: they were in they and you know, that little effort

886
00:46:02,440 --> 00:46:04,600
Speaker 2: that began with a handful of people in a room

887
00:46:05,120 --> 00:46:08,720
Speaker 2: has blossomed into just last month, a new national monument

888
00:46:08,760 --> 00:46:10,320
Speaker 2: that's going to be the Emmett Till and made Me

889
00:46:10,400 --> 00:46:14,960
Speaker 2: Till Mobile National Monument that President Biden just signed into law. Right,

890
00:46:15,000 --> 00:46:17,960
Speaker 2: So that's a pretty big trajectory from people in a

891
00:46:18,040 --> 00:46:20,920
Speaker 2: room in a rural county in Mississippi where you know,

892
00:46:21,080 --> 00:46:24,800
Speaker 2: racial political tensions are really high, but yet found a

893
00:46:24,840 --> 00:46:27,239
Speaker 2: way to kind of hold enough people together to kind

894
00:46:27,239 --> 00:46:29,960
Speaker 2: of move forward there. I think similar story even in

895
00:46:29,960 --> 00:46:33,840
Speaker 2: Tulsa and Duluth. They're messy stories, but there are stories

896
00:46:33,840 --> 00:46:37,279
Speaker 2: of movement and progress and truth telling that leads, I

897
00:46:37,320 --> 00:46:40,440
Speaker 2: think to the kind of repair and healing that we're

898
00:46:40,640 --> 00:46:43,359
Speaker 2: needing in the country. I think, in fact, when we're

899
00:46:43,400 --> 00:46:46,760
Speaker 2: reading the backlash, reading of the resistance is in fact

900
00:46:47,160 --> 00:46:50,920
Speaker 2: a backlash to that movement in a more positive direction

901
00:46:51,000 --> 00:46:53,920
Speaker 2: and a more pluralistic, democratic direction. But there is a

902
00:46:54,000 --> 00:46:56,880
Speaker 2: kind of backlash that we're experiencing now, so you know,

903
00:46:57,239 --> 00:46:59,279
Speaker 2: look ahead again. I think that's where I find I

904
00:46:59,280 --> 00:47:02,800
Speaker 2: think some hope is that these local efforts aren't just

905
00:47:02,840 --> 00:47:06,279
Speaker 2: following the headlines. Unusual, unexpected things are happening, you know,

906
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:08,160
Speaker 2: when people who are neighbors who are actually trying to

907
00:47:08,200 --> 00:47:10,200
Speaker 2: get to know each other. And I think that's true

908
00:47:10,200 --> 00:47:12,600
Speaker 2: for all of us, right, So, I think as these

909
00:47:12,600 --> 00:47:14,440
Speaker 2: things get built at the local level, one of the

910
00:47:14,440 --> 00:47:16,840
Speaker 2: things that did in all of these places is it

911
00:47:16,880 --> 00:47:19,279
Speaker 2: put people in the room together that wouldn't normally be

912
00:47:19,280 --> 00:47:21,359
Speaker 2: in the room together, and they tried to kind of

913
00:47:21,440 --> 00:47:24,040
Speaker 2: wrestle it out and it changed everyone in the process.

914
00:47:25,360 --> 00:47:27,640
Speaker 1: The show is about learning moments, even though we're talking

915
00:47:27,680 --> 00:47:31,719
Speaker 1: about the roots of vast and intractable, seemingly intractable problems.

916
00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:35,600
Speaker 1: I wanted to ask you, what did you learn from

917
00:47:35,640 --> 00:47:39,000
Speaker 1: working on your book that you didn't know prior to

918
00:47:39,040 --> 00:47:40,080
Speaker 1: engaging with that work.

919
00:47:40,960 --> 00:47:44,880
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, the book started actually without including indigenous history,

920
00:47:45,400 --> 00:47:48,000
Speaker 2: and it actually became a very central part of the book.

921
00:47:48,080 --> 00:47:51,440
Speaker 2: But it was along the way that I realized, oh,

922
00:47:51,560 --> 00:47:53,759
Speaker 2: wait a minute, I really not going to understand what

923
00:47:53,760 --> 00:47:56,480
Speaker 2: happened to m until and let's say, understand what happened

924
00:47:56,480 --> 00:48:00,839
Speaker 2: to the Choctaw before it's slaved Africans entered this. I'm

925
00:48:00,840 --> 00:48:03,200
Speaker 2: not going to understand what happened at the Tulsa Race

926
00:48:03,239 --> 00:48:06,040
Speaker 2: massacre without understanding what happened to the Osage. We're gonna

927
00:48:06,040 --> 00:48:07,719
Speaker 2: have a whole movie about that coming out, Killers of

928
00:48:07,760 --> 00:48:10,360
Speaker 2: the Flower Moon very soon. I can't understand really what

929
00:48:10,440 --> 00:48:14,040
Speaker 2: happened in lynching these three African American men without understanding

930
00:48:14,160 --> 00:48:17,360
Speaker 2: the mass execution of thirty eight Dakoda men and the

931
00:48:17,400 --> 00:48:19,399
Speaker 2: eighteen hundreds, and so I think it's like seeing those

932
00:48:19,440 --> 00:48:22,280
Speaker 2: stories together was what I think was really the biggest

933
00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:24,920
Speaker 2: learning moment for me, because you know what little Indigenous

934
00:48:24,960 --> 00:48:27,279
Speaker 2: history I knew, and it was very little. It had

935
00:48:27,320 --> 00:48:30,680
Speaker 2: got very little for my formal education. And that's saying

936
00:48:30,719 --> 00:48:33,279
Speaker 2: someone for someone of the PhD in American religion that

937
00:48:33,360 --> 00:48:36,800
Speaker 2: I nonetheless got very little about Indigenous people. So I

938
00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:38,399
Speaker 2: think that was one of the biggest things, is seeing

939
00:48:38,480 --> 00:48:42,279
Speaker 2: that come through and just seeing those interconnections and helping

940
00:48:42,320 --> 00:48:44,920
Speaker 2: to see a more holistic story about how it got

941
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:46,319
Speaker 2: to be who we are and where we are.

942
00:48:47,880 --> 00:48:50,040
Speaker 1: Robbie, I could continue on and on with you, but

943
00:48:50,200 --> 00:48:53,120
Speaker 1: we've unfortunately we've run out of time, and I really

944
00:48:53,200 --> 00:48:54,520
Speaker 1: appreciate you coming on today.

945
00:48:55,480 --> 00:48:57,319
Speaker 2: Thank you, knows I'm really happy to be here. Thanks

946
00:48:57,320 --> 00:48:57,680
Speaker 2: for having me.

947
00:48:58,440 --> 00:49:00,320
Speaker 1: Robbie Jones is the author of The Hidden Roots of

948
00:49:00,360 --> 00:49:03,320
Speaker 1: White Supremacy and the president and founder of the Public

949
00:49:03,400 --> 00:49:06,640
Speaker 1: Religious Research Institute. He also has a newsletter you can

950
00:49:06,680 --> 00:49:12,160
Speaker 1: subscribe to Robert P. Jones dot substack dot com Here

951
00:49:12,200 --> 00:49:16,920
Speaker 1: at crash Course, we believe the collisions can be messy, impressive, challenging, surprising,

952
00:49:17,280 --> 00:49:21,160
Speaker 1: and always instructive. In today's Crash Course, I learned that

953
00:49:21,239 --> 00:49:25,240
Speaker 1: Christianity and racism, which I often thought of as inherently

954
00:49:25,320 --> 00:49:29,640
Speaker 1: being an opposition, are perhaps more often than not adjacent

955
00:49:29,719 --> 00:49:32,920
Speaker 1: to one another. What did you learn? We'd love to

956
00:49:32,960 --> 00:49:35,600
Speaker 1: hear from you. You can tweet at the Bloomberg Opinion

957
00:49:35,640 --> 00:49:39,400
Speaker 1: handle at Opinion or me at Tim O'Brien using the

958
00:49:39,480 --> 00:49:42,920
Speaker 1: hashtag Bloomberg Crash Course. You can also subscribe to our

959
00:49:42,960 --> 00:49:45,960
Speaker 1: show wherever you're listening right now, and please leave us

960
00:49:46,000 --> 00:49:48,920
Speaker 1: a review. It helps more people find the show. This

961
00:49:49,080 --> 00:49:53,360
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the indispensable anam Azarakas, Moses ondem

962
00:49:53,480 --> 00:49:57,160
Speaker 1: and me. Our supervising producer is Magnus Hendrickson, and we

963
00:49:57,239 --> 00:50:01,239
Speaker 1: had editing help from Sagebauman, Jeff Grocot, Mike Nitze and

964
00:50:01,400 --> 00:50:05,320
Speaker 1: Christine Danden Bilart. Blake Maples says, our sound engineering and

965
00:50:05,440 --> 00:50:08,640
Speaker 1: our original theme song was composed by Luis Garra. I'm

966
00:50:08,680 --> 00:50:11,600
Speaker 1: Tim O'Brien. We'll be back next week with another Crash

967
00:50:11,640 --> 00:50:11,879
Speaker 1: Court