Speaker 1: Keep on riding with us, says, we continue to broadcast
Speaker 1: the balance and defend the discourse from the Hip Hop
Speaker 1: Weekly Studios. Welcome back to Civic Cipher. I am your host,
Speaker 1: Ramsey's job.
Speaker 2: He is ramses Jah. I am q Ward. You are
Speaker 2: tuned into Civic Cipher.
Speaker 1: Indeed you are, and we still got some more scife
Speaker 1: life in store for you, so stick around for that.
Speaker 1: We are going to be spending some time discussing what
Speaker 1: it means to be blinded by privilege. This is going
Speaker 1: to be a big one, so buckle up because a
Speaker 1: lot of people have a tough time with this. People
Speaker 1: cannot see how things are easy for them, and as
Speaker 1: a result, they think that they work harder than everybody
Speaker 1: else and they deserve everything that they have, instead of
Speaker 1: reframing things around a set of fortunate circumstances into which
Speaker 1: they were born. We are going to do our best
Speaker 1: to explain how you can easily be blinded by that.
Speaker 1: Indeed we all are. Even sometimes before we get there, though,
Speaker 1: it's time to discuss Baba becoming a better ally Baba.
Speaker 1: On Today's Baba sponsored by Friends of the Movement, you
Speaker 1: can sign up for the Free Voter whileer from Fotmglobal
Speaker 1: dot com to support black businesses and allied businesses as
Speaker 1: well as make an impact with your spending. Again, that's
Speaker 1: Fotmglobal dot com And today we are going to ask
Speaker 1: you to donate to the National Urban League that is
Speaker 1: inuel dot org and I'm going to share just from
Speaker 1: their website. Join the fight against unfair laws, job limitations,
Speaker 1: and racial inequality. We provide direct and free services to
Speaker 1: two million people across the country and are making a
Speaker 1: real impact on communities. But we can't do it without
Speaker 1: your help. Many individuals support the National Urban League movement
Speaker 1: through a variety of opportunities that allow the public to
Speaker 1: donate in an easy and convenient way. We are here
Speaker 1: on the ground across the nation to help people from
Speaker 1: all walks of life and communities with urgency, expertise and compassion.
Speaker 1: Your donation is vital to our work and will help
Speaker 1: to ensure that our services remain free of charge. And
Speaker 1: there's a quote that I want to share. I think
Speaker 1: it's beautiful quote. Every man is our brother, and every
Speaker 1: man's birth is our own. Where poverty exists, we are
Speaker 1: all poorer. Where hate flourishes, we are all corrupted. Where
Speaker 1: injustice reigns, we are all unequal, And that's from Whitney
Speaker 1: Mjung And then they add another thing here I want
Speaker 1: you to keep with you. Making a gift can be
Speaker 1: as simple as texting INU well give to forty one
Speaker 1: for forty four or visiting again inuel dot org. And
Speaker 1: while we're here, I do want to take a moment
Speaker 1: to share with you that Q and I will be
Speaker 1: speaking at the National Urban League Conference in It might
Speaker 1: be later next week, we might be doing that your
Speaker 1: national convention, National convention, that's correct, So we will be
Speaker 1: there on the ground presenting in New Orleans.
Speaker 2: In New Orleans.
Speaker 1: Indeed, so again check out innuel dot org not only
Speaker 1: to make a donation, but to get more information on
Speaker 1: what's going on and maybe how you can even tap
Speaker 1: in with us while we're down there. Now we're going
Speaker 1: to talk about what it means to be blinded by privilege.
Speaker 1: And before I unbuckle Q, allow me to share just
Speaker 1: a brief story that kind of inspired this thought. This
Speaker 1: comes from the Black Information Network. Okay, a GOP lawmaker
Speaker 1: is facing backlash after referring to White House Press Secretary
Speaker 1: Kareem Jane Pierre as a quote DEI Hire. Colorado Representative
Speaker 1: Lauren Bobert suggested that Jean Pierre was only hired to
Speaker 1: fill a diversity quota. Quote. I couldn't care less about
Speaker 1: what at press sec has to say today, she tweeted.
Speaker 1: Quote it's between ten am and four pm, which means
Speaker 1: quote President Joe Biden should be coherent enough to take
Speaker 1: a few questions from the press. Instead, Americans are supposed
Speaker 1: to listen to the disc credited DEI hire pass. Jean
Speaker 1: Pierre was named White House Press Secretary in twenty twenty
Speaker 1: two after serving as the Deputy Press Secretary. She previously
Speaker 1: worked on former President Barack Obama's and Senator John Edwards's
Speaker 1: presidential campaigns. So what we're saying here is that this woman,
Speaker 1: Lauren Bobert, I don't want to say that she's a
Speaker 1: racist person.
Speaker 2: Why don't you want to say so?
Speaker 1: Because it's it's easy. I'm not saying it's not true.
Speaker 1: It's easy to say that and then dismiss this. What
Speaker 1: I want to do is focus on because she wouldn't
Speaker 1: say that about herself. But what I want to do
Speaker 1: is make a point about her being blinded by her
Speaker 1: own privilege. Okay, so again, we're not going to say
Speaker 1: that she's just being racist again, because that's that's the
Speaker 1: easy thing to do. It's factual, I believe, and it's
Speaker 1: right there for anybody to take it. But I think
Speaker 1: there's a deeper level here that all of us can
Speaker 1: benefit from learning and understanding. Right, So let me back
Speaker 1: up a bit. The Press secretary Kareem Jean Pierre.
Speaker 2: She was the.
Speaker 1: Deputy Press Secretary until twenty twenty two, and prior to
Speaker 1: that she worked on Obama's and John Edwards presidential campaigns. Right,
Speaker 1: so you're talking about going back. Geez, how long ago
Speaker 1: was that? Two thousand and let's see Obama was what eight,
Speaker 1: so you're talking two thousand and four. She started working
Speaker 1: for Senator Edwards in two thousand and four. Year, yeah,
Speaker 1: so two thousand and four. So my mass could so
Speaker 1: what we have, as a woman who's been more or
Speaker 1: less in the same job for twenty years, twenty years
Speaker 1: on the job, experience is more. It qualifies you better
Speaker 1: than a degree, It qualifies you better than just about it. However,
Speaker 1: she has her masters from Columbia. Okay, let's book affairs that. Okay,
Speaker 1: Now this isn't necessarily just in.
Speaker 2: Case you want to disqualify her on the lack of
Speaker 2: merrit in one of those areas lack of experience or
Speaker 2: lack of education. She checks both boxes. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: with a bullet. Yeah, you don't make it to the
Speaker 2: White House unless you do, right.
Speaker 1: But well, oh well, as a presidency, presidency you might
Speaker 1: be able to We've seen Bush, We've seen Trump.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I get you. But even even Bush, however, was
Speaker 2: a lawmaker before he was the president. That's fair, fair
Speaker 2: point this other guy. Yeah, yeah, there's you can do
Speaker 2: so and the people he plans to bring with him.
Speaker 1: You know what's interesting while we're here. While we're here,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because this country was always supposed to be
Speaker 1: a government. I have a government that was for the people,
Speaker 1: by the people, right, And there are other parts of
Speaker 1: the world where they think that's absolutely crazy. How in
Speaker 1: the world can people govern themsel? This is what they think?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: How is an entire population educated enough? How can they
Speaker 1: know enough to decide what's right for themselves in terms
Speaker 1: of like a framework for their society. Can they decide
Speaker 1: for their home?
Speaker 2: Sure?
Speaker 1: Can they decide for their media community?
Speaker 2: Sure?
Speaker 1: Should they have representation? Absolutely? But there are other people
Speaker 1: who feel like, no, there should be a decider and
Speaker 1: that person should or a very small governing body, and
Speaker 1: they should take the information and data and then make
Speaker 1: the best decisions right now. Obviously that framework has a
Speaker 1: lot of potential for corruption, but it's interesting that there's
Speaker 1: another way of thinking. How you know folks can.
Speaker 2: Govern because work does as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but as you mentioned, there are people that will
Speaker 1: elect a person who is not qualified to lead us all,
Speaker 1: and then that person, because they were elected, leads us
Speaker 1: all into the abyss.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Anyway, back to what I'm talking about, Korean Jane Pierre,
Speaker 1: the Press Secretary of the White House. This is not
Speaker 1: about her, although we could talk about the glorious example
Speaker 1: of ebony excellence that she is until we're blue in
Speaker 1: the face, and I think we might right now. What
Speaker 1: I want to focus on is.
Speaker 2: The woman, the woman calling her qualification into question.
Speaker 1: Okay, so here's where I want to go with that.
Speaker 1: And then I'm gonna I'm gonna unleash you or unbuckle
Speaker 1: you whatever I said before. Okay, So what I did
Speaker 1: was I googled Lauren Bobert, Okay, and specifically because I
Speaker 1: saw that she only had a GED's funny that the
Speaker 1: press secretary has a master's degree and has worked in
Speaker 1: the job for twenty years. Right, But I saw on
Speaker 1: social media that Lauren Bobert had a GED. So I
Speaker 1: googled that does Lauren Bobert have a GED or did
Speaker 1: she get a GED? So you can replicate these results.
Speaker 1: Did Lauren Bobert get a GED? You're able to see
Speaker 1: for yourself.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: The answer that I got back was Bobert dropped out
Speaker 1: of high school during her senior year in two thousand
Speaker 1: and four.
Speaker 2: Okay, So you mean the year she dropped out of
Speaker 2: high school was the same year. That was the same
Speaker 2: year that this young lady received her master's degree and
Speaker 2: started her career in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: So okay, okay, so you put it together for me.
Speaker 2: Thank you. You always there when I was asking a question
Speaker 2: I want the question? Okay is all we need? Okay?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 1: Lauren Bolbert dropped out of highchool during her senior year
Speaker 1: in two thousand and four when she had a baby.
Speaker 1: She earned a GED certificate in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: So sixteen years later, right before she ran for office,
Speaker 2: I believe a month before her first election, primer Okay,
Speaker 2: that's that's what I expected.
Speaker 1: Bobert has stated that her family depended on welfare when
Speaker 1: she was growing up, and that she was raised in
Speaker 1: a democratic household in a liberal area. Okay, that's something,
Speaker 1: So hang on, heim, because I'm gonna let you go
Speaker 1: and then it's all yours. But you know, there's been
Speaker 1: these terms assigned to black people, black women in particular,
Speaker 1: welfare queens and all this sort of stuff. Right, and
Speaker 1: then now that the new incarnation of that is DEI hire, where.
Speaker 2: Prior to that it was affirmative action.
Speaker 1: Higher, there you go, and the idea there is to
Speaker 1: discredit a person's qualifications because they are black, rather than
Speaker 1: to look at, geez, what all did you have to
Speaker 1: get through to get here? Because it's tough, period, it's
Speaker 1: got to be extra tough doing it while black and
Speaker 1: a woman.
Speaker 2: Right, But no, dee I hire. Right.
Speaker 1: So here is what it means to be blinded by privilege.
Speaker 1: This woman, Lauren Bobert, looked over the entirety of her
Speaker 1: own experience, saw no connective tissues, saw no shared struggles,
Speaker 1: saw none of that. Even though it's true, this is
Speaker 1: this is this is what comes up, and these are
Speaker 1: stories that she shared verifiable fact. This is, but she
Speaker 1: didn't see any of that. She saw a dei hire,
Speaker 1: in other words, someone who's not qualified to be theirs.
Speaker 1: The only reason is that they're standing there is because
Speaker 1: they are black. They check a box and there was
Speaker 1: a quota to feel there you go right. And for her,
Speaker 1: she is blinded by her own privilege, because you have
Speaker 1: to be in order to get something like that off.
Speaker 1: She ignored the fact that her own life, she got
Speaker 1: pregnant in high school, dropped out oft offer. She didn't
Speaker 1: even do the research because her assumption is that this
Speaker 1: woman is not qualified because she is a dei hier,
Speaker 1: she's a black woman. That's the only place where it
Speaker 1: comes from. And now we can introduce racis into the conversation.
Speaker 1: Now we can have that part of the conversation because
Speaker 1: that's the only place that comes from. And I challenge
Speaker 1: you to convince me of anything different. And again, I
Speaker 1: don't want to call her racist. I want to call
Speaker 1: her blinded by her own privilege. But after you see
Speaker 1: that she's blinded by her own privilege, you see that
Speaker 1: takes a very dark, negative, angry turn. And now we
Speaker 1: can have the racist conversation So, now that we've started here,
Speaker 1: I know that you had a couple of bullets, bullet
Speaker 1: points I should say that you wanted to touch on
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 2: I want to first point out that in two thousand
Speaker 2: and four, when this young lady accusing her of being
Speaker 2: a DEI hire was dropping out of school and not
Speaker 2: getting a high school diploma, Kareem Jane Pierre was the
Speaker 2: political director for Senator John Edwards presidential campaign. I didn't
Speaker 2: want it to seem like she was like an intern
Speaker 2: or starting in some entry level position. I want to
Speaker 2: give an example that's a little left or right, however
Speaker 2: you view it, of what we've been talking about so far.
Speaker 2: The Conservative Party in this country only exist because they've
Speaker 2: found a way to pull the blinders of privilege over
Speaker 2: the eyes of everyone, so that we all find a
Speaker 2: way to ignore that obvious connective tissue that you pointed out,
Speaker 2: that obvious shared struggle, and only protect even at our
Speaker 2: own peril, our own privilege. Well what do you mean, Q,
Speaker 2: I'm glad you asked. I am a heterosexual, Christian black man,
Speaker 2: and if you remove the word black, I almost check
Speaker 2: every privileged box that this country has. Hewth Ever, provided
Speaker 2: that get it. So it is very easy, as we've seen,
Speaker 2: for a Christian, heterosexual black man, to be blinded by
Speaker 2: privilege and stand next to a person like our former
Speaker 2: president and hail him as a great person, ignoring all
Speaker 2: the awful things that that person would have in store
Speaker 2: for people who look like you and have your shared
Speaker 2: experience because you somehow made it to the position that
Speaker 2: you're in. When I see people who check the boxes
Speaker 2: that I check, not stand up for people who don't
Speaker 2: check all of those is a very, very disheartening thing
Speaker 2: to witness. The example that I use most noticeably is
Speaker 2: our LGBTQ community LGBTQ plus community, because I see people
Speaker 2: point the finger in judgment, look down their noses, and
Speaker 2: wave their bibles at people in that community as somehow
Speaker 2: less deserving of all the wonderful things that life should
Speaker 2: provide all of us than they are. And in that
Speaker 2: division is how the other side remains in power. You
Speaker 2: could argue that a black, homosexual, atheist woman is a
Speaker 2: quadruple minority, does not check any of the boxes of
Speaker 2: being worth anything, no power boxes there, looked down upon,
Speaker 2: probably by each of the groups that she belongs.
Speaker 1: There's someone that will find fault with her.
Speaker 2: Yeah, your black Christian friends think that you're a sinner. Yeah,
Speaker 2: your white straight friends see you as black and homosexual.
Speaker 2: Some of your white homosexual friends have the white box,
Speaker 2: which means there's a portion of their privilege that they
Speaker 2: have to protect and at some point will discredit yours.
Speaker 2: The women that you know that are married to men
Speaker 2: that check those that check all those boxes will vote
Speaker 2: against their own best interests and speak out in march
Speaker 2: and organize against their own best interests because they see
Speaker 2: the benefit of the privilege of their spouse. Like there's
Speaker 2: so many Yes, there's so many different ways that without
Speaker 2: even realizing it, in order to protect what privilege you
Speaker 2: sometimes are not even paying attention to the fact that
Speaker 2: you have and or sometimes in this case, that you
Speaker 2: are very aware that you have, that you will ignore
Speaker 2: that very privileged that allows you to have the life
Speaker 2: that you enjoy. Because if you set their resumes next
Speaker 2: to one another, I say, one could argue, but that's
Speaker 2: it's just way too obvious that Laurene how do you
Speaker 2: say her name, Bobert did nothing to be qualified to
Speaker 2: be in a position that she's in nothing at all,
Speaker 2: And looks around at everybody else and points at how
Speaker 2: they're somehow being made an exception for it is maddening,
Speaker 2: but it is how we got here, right when you
Speaker 2: look at how people vote, when you look at how
Speaker 2: people organize, when you look at what's most important to
Speaker 2: most people, We've found a way to disassociate ourselves from
Speaker 2: people who don't share every experience that we have and
Speaker 2: have found a way to litigate our own privilege and
Speaker 2: credit it to our own merit and our own hard work,
Speaker 2: and don't realize that some of that was privileged, and
Speaker 2: in a lot of cases all of it.
Speaker 1: Sure, let me jump in here, this is still you.
Speaker 1: But that's kind of what I was alluding to earlier,
Speaker 1: where I was saying that everybody works hard. I just
Speaker 1: push back against that. I know you don't like when
Speaker 1: I call myself lazy, because I know that I'm not lazy,
Speaker 1: but I work hard so that it's maniacal.
Speaker 2: It's so lazy. It's as big an antonym as you
Speaker 2: could use to describe yourself. Papoid pair point.
Speaker 1: But there are people that work harder than me. There
Speaker 1: are bona fide workaholics that exist, And if you were
Speaker 1: to compare anything a career, accolades, net worth, pick a thing.
Speaker 1: It might on paper look like I have more of
Speaker 1: those things than indeed the workaholics. Okay, hard work is
Speaker 1: something that everyone does, and granted there are people who
Speaker 1: work harder, but that in and of itself does not
Speaker 1: guarantee the levels and the types of success that we
Speaker 1: espouse in this country. So that cannot be in and
Speaker 1: of itself a reliable predictor of outcomes.
Speaker 2: Absolutely not. We want credit for all that we think
Speaker 2: we accomplished that and will not acknowledge where there was
Speaker 2: grace and luck and help luck and you help.
Speaker 1: See opportunities and and you know what school did your.
Speaker 2: Dad go to? And is that why you get to
Speaker 2: say the N word? Don't say nepotism because that doesn't exist.
Speaker 1: On and on and on, right, And I get it.
Speaker 1: You know, maybe for some people who are white and
Speaker 1: check all these boxes, they had no nepotism, They didn't
Speaker 1: have a daddy that went to a school, they didn't
Speaker 1: have you know whatever. But there are still invisible forces
Speaker 1: that if they don't work for you, at least they're not.
Speaker 2: Working against you. They're not working against you, right.
Speaker 1: And so that privilege again just being a white a
Speaker 1: mediocre white woman who did everything wrong in her life.
Speaker 1: She was pregnant, I mean, not wrong, but everything that
Speaker 1: we use, you know, by societal standards. She's a failureship
Speaker 1: and graduated high school, she has gd she had kids
Speaker 1: in high school, all this sort of stuff. Right, that's
Speaker 1: a failure on paper.
Speaker 2: Right, Well, that's not a failure on paper. It's just
Speaker 2: that those are the type of things that would disqualify us, right, Okay,
Speaker 2: so type of things intentionally used to disqualify poor people. Okay,
Speaker 2: so watch this intentionally, So watch.
Speaker 1: Where we're going. Now, what we're seeing is a mediocre,
Speaker 1: if I'm being honest, white woman who is now one
Speaker 1: of the more famous lawmakers that we have in this land.
Speaker 1: And we have a black woman with over two decades
Speaker 1: of experience on the job crushing it with a master's
Speaker 1: degree getting picked apart by the very woman who is mediocre.
Speaker 1: And this can only happen if a person is blind
Speaker 1: to their own privilege, If this this only happens to
Speaker 1: a person that thinks, well, I worked hard for my position.
Speaker 2: Everyone else should.
Speaker 1: That's the only scenario, or everyone else didn't.
Speaker 2: Boom.
Speaker 1: So that's a conversation that we might have to revisit
Speaker 1: if I'm honest, but for now we are going to
Speaker 1: leave that one where it is as always. I'd like
Speaker 1: to thank you for tuning in to Civic Cipher. I
Speaker 1: have been your host Rams's Jaw I am still Ceward.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to hold on to that as long as
Speaker 1: i can. Man, we almost set to finish loan for
Speaker 1: for this for this chapter. I know we got a
Speaker 1: long long road ahead of us, but for this particular chapter,
Speaker 1: we're almost there. Do us a favorite, follow us on
Speaker 1: our social media, shoot Q some love and encouragement. You
Speaker 1: can find me at Rams's Jaw.
Speaker 2: I am Qward on all socials.
Speaker 1: And then, of course, so follow the show at Civic
Speaker 1: Cipher c I B I C c I p h
Speaker 1: e R. Hit the website Civiccipher dot com. You can
Speaker 1: download this in any previous episodes. You can shoot us
Speaker 1: any questions you might have, any topics you might want
Speaker 1: us to cover.
Speaker 2: Like comment, share a subscribe, hit us
Speaker 1: On YouTube that is YouTube dot com, slash Civiccipher and
Speaker 1: until next week, y'all, peace, peace,