Speaker 1: And now watch my back.
Speaker 2: You're like, just strike.
Speaker 3: Waters from headquarters behind him and step.
Speaker 2: In the borders. If you're just tuning into Civic Cipher Iron,
Speaker 2: your host ramses josh I go by the name of
Speaker 2: q Ward. Yes, indeed, and if you just tune it in,
Speaker 2: be sure to stick around because we're examining some interesting
Speaker 2: points made by a social media influencer he called. His
Speaker 2: name is Dan Price Seattle. He had a stream of consciousness,
Speaker 2: uh not too long ago and put some hard hitting
Speaker 2: facts up and we're reviewing them now. But let's before
Speaker 2: we get back into that, discuss how to become a
Speaker 2: better ally. So we're talking about this gentleman, Dan Price
Speaker 2: Seattle at Dan Price Seattle on Twitter and and for
Speaker 2: today's Baba become a better ally, I would like for
Speaker 2: you to follow him, subscribe to his feed, even if
Speaker 2: you don't want to follow him, review it. You'll see
Speaker 2: that these sources are well documented and you'll be able
Speaker 2: to you know, it's just one of those rabbit holes
Speaker 2: that you might want to plug into if you want
Speaker 2: to become a better ally, if you want to become
Speaker 2: a better brother or sister to you know, people who
Speaker 2: don't look like you this is the way to do it.
Speaker 2: But he's not the only one. There's another person I'm
Speaker 2: a big fan of. His name is Brian Stevenson, and
Speaker 2: he is the person behind the movie Just Mercy starring
Speaker 2: Jamie Fox and Michael B. Jordan. But I've known Brian
Speaker 2: Stevenson for a very very long time. I got put
Speaker 2: on him in like twenty twelve or something because of
Speaker 2: a Ted talk. I love this guy, and you can
Speaker 2: follow him at EJI Underscore o RG EJI standing for
Speaker 2: Equal Justice Initiative, which is his initiative. If you know
Speaker 2: inmate rights and sent and you know the criminal justice
Speaker 2: system is more your thing. You know, Dan Price, of
Speaker 2: course is more about economics and business and that sort
Speaker 2: of stuff. But Brian Stevenson eji dot org. Be sure
Speaker 2: to check him out if you know the criminal justice
Speaker 2: system is something you need to learn about. A group
Speaker 2: I follow on Facebook that I really wish more people
Speaker 2: knew about is called Audit. The Audit and what they
Speaker 2: do is they monitor police interactions and they'll take the
Speaker 2: video and they'll have a lawyer or some educated person
Speaker 2: examine what's happening during the interactions. And it's just a
Speaker 2: great way to get educated so that we know what's
Speaker 2: happening and we can I think that's the best way
Speaker 2: to support the police is by knowing what it is
Speaker 2: they should be doing. And I will leave you with
Speaker 2: a name, Janeelliott dot com. Even if you don't really
Speaker 2: plug in, she's someone that you need to know about
Speaker 2: and that is how you can become a better ally.
Speaker 2: Now back to Dan Price, I feel like I want
Speaker 2: to get some thoughts from UQ before we jump back in.
Speaker 2: How are you feeling so far?
Speaker 1: I just want people to kind of process all this
Speaker 1: data and this information with this lens. These are not
Speaker 1: random statistical anomalies. It be impossible for these statistics to
Speaker 1: be slighted this heavy and disfavor of black people. It'd
Speaker 1: be impossible for that to be random. So view all
Speaker 1: of this information through that lens. This is systemic. This
Speaker 1: is intentional. This is not just by happenstance, like Man,
Speaker 1: all those all those statistics really just randomly worked out
Speaker 1: that way for those people. No, they absolutely did not.
Speaker 1: This system was very intentionally put into place to have
Speaker 1: these outcomes. And when you're hearing all of this information
Speaker 1: through that lens, it hits you a little bit different.
Speaker 2: I want to read something, at least it should I
Speaker 2: want to read something that I came across. I might
Speaker 2: share this on our social media page eventually, which, by
Speaker 2: the way, follow us at Civic Cipher, c Ivic c I,
Speaker 2: P H E R on all social media. To your point, Q,
Speaker 2: and this is about critical race theory. And normally I
Speaker 2: don't do this sort of thing, but just I think
Speaker 2: it helps illustrate your point. A person asked, I get
Speaker 2: that the GOP does not want CRT critical race theory
Speaker 2: to be taught in schools, but can you tell me
Speaker 2: what CRT really is? And the answer is my pleasure.
Speaker 2: Critical race theory was developed by a largely African American
Speaker 2: group of law professors starting in the nineteen seventies when
Speaker 2: they noticed that the elimination of racist laws didn't actually
Speaker 2: do much to make the justice system less racist. The
Speaker 2: theory part is that systems and institutions set up prior
Speaker 2: to the elimination of racist laws still maintain those racist
Speaker 2: origins and are why the legal system still has racist outcomes,
Speaker 2: such as the fact that black people are less likely
Speaker 2: to have charges dropped before trial than white people. It's
Speaker 2: something you might study in a postgraduate law program, assuming
Speaker 2: you're working with one of the dozen or so professors
Speaker 2: that are actually working in that area. As such, you
Speaker 2: won't study it in law school, university, and especially not
Speaker 2: in high school or elementary school. It would like it
Speaker 2: would be like trying to teach topography in math class.
Speaker 2: You need a lot more math than you'll ever be
Speaker 2: able to learn in high school to even begin to
Speaker 2: try to understand it. Now, what people try to say
Speaker 2: is critical race theory, like teaching about racism in America,
Speaker 2: is actually what is known as American history. Children in
Speaker 2: elementary school and high school aren't being taught that now
Speaker 2: because people who actually did those bad things are often
Speaker 2: still alive and don't want people to know what bad
Speaker 2: things they did. One of the problems is that slavery
Speaker 2: is taught as the history of black people and not
Speaker 2: the history of white people. So I think it was
Speaker 2: important to read that because again it illustrates that there
Speaker 2: are systems that are set up where even if you
Speaker 2: change the laws, the system, the mechanism creates these outcomes,
Speaker 2: and it's reinforced subtly in the minds of some people,
Speaker 2: but also in the framework of society, like subtle conditioning
Speaker 2: and then more formal institutions elsewhere. You know, we talk
Speaker 2: about them all the time, you know, and I don't.
Speaker 2: I'm learning to not bully the police because I don't
Speaker 2: believe that two wrongs make a right, and I do
Speaker 2: recognize the human beings in the uniforms, but I will
Speaker 2: forever remain critical of the institution as long as that
Speaker 2: institution ends lives needlessly, pretty much as long as you're
Speaker 2: carrying guns, because that feels a little like, all right, well,
Speaker 2: just in case I need to end the life today,
Speaker 2: go ahead, qu you jump in.
Speaker 1: That's a very interesting way to pull to put that
Speaker 1: just in case of you know, might need to kill someone,
Speaker 1: and there, let's make sure we got the tools.
Speaker 2: That we need. Why not get a bulletproof vests if
Speaker 2: you need to protect yourself, that's protection. A gun is
Speaker 2: to kill someone. I don't dah man or put in
Speaker 2: the drunk.
Speaker 1: I wanted to point out the use, or almost the
Speaker 1: manipulation of people's very vague understanding of critical race theory.
Speaker 1: A certain sector of our population has has has gone
Speaker 1: to dog was liistling in a way that they know
Speaker 1: a lot of people don't know what that means. Right.
Speaker 1: They've made it scary, attached it to everything having anything
Speaker 1: to do with segments of American history like slavery, and
Speaker 1: scared people into thinking our kids shouldn't learn about this,
Speaker 1: even though, as you just pointed out, they're not one
Speaker 1: and the same. You guys don't want us to teach
Speaker 1: our kids' American history is what it is. But if
Speaker 1: you said that out loud, people would think you were ridiculous.
Speaker 1: So you have to brand it as critical race theory,
Speaker 1: knowing that hundreds of millions of people have no idea
Speaker 1: what that means. Make it a scary term, just like
Speaker 1: socialism because a lot of people don't know what that
Speaker 1: means either. But if I can make it scary and
Speaker 1: give it a somewhat permanent negative connotation, I can dog
Speaker 1: with a large groups of people using these scary terms
Speaker 1: and get the outcomes that I want. So it's just
Speaker 1: interesting to hear you read that definition, because I'm sure
Speaker 1: there are people listening to this show that heard that
Speaker 1: definition the first time today, but have heard critical race
Speaker 1: theory said one hundred times before.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and they didn't know what it was. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 2: to their credit, the right, the conservative wing of this
Speaker 2: country is excellent when it comes to marketing, especially marketing fear.
Speaker 2: I've never like, Wow, I went to school for marketing.
Speaker 2: I have a degree hanging on my wall and I
Speaker 2: so I can see it and it is not got
Speaker 2: milk is It is not you know, have it your way.
Speaker 2: It is not that it is different. It is like
Speaker 2: like they get in the head of these people freaking out.
Speaker 2: They have a lot of people thinking that we are
Speaker 2: the enemy. It's the wildest thing, yo. We the only
Speaker 2: thing that we asked for is equality and never revenge.
Speaker 2: Never in any circle have I ever heard that we
Speaker 2: need to get revenge. No, we need to get equality.
Speaker 2: We need to get equity, we need to get a
Speaker 2: fair shot, we need to you know, we need what
Speaker 2: this thing is promise to its citizens.
Speaker 1: People would would view as minimums.
Speaker 2: Yeah, many's the most that we ask for. The minimum.
Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely, So So let's get back into Dan Price.
Speaker 2: That detour was necessary. I'm glad we took that one.
Speaker 2: But let's get back here. So there's some more slides before. Actually,
Speaker 2: before we get into this. There are some people black
Speaker 2: people who make a point of identifying quote unquote white saviors.
Speaker 2: What this term means is a person that comes in
Speaker 2: and says, oh, poor black people. I'm white, so I'm
Speaker 2: going to save them as opposed to, Hey, look this
Speaker 2: doesn't look right. I respect black people and brown people there.
Speaker 2: They're thinkers. They're They're not just rappers and singers and
Speaker 2: you know all that dancers, their thinkers, you know, their leaders,
Speaker 2: their politicians, everything that, everything that anyone else is. So
Speaker 2: we will figure out what it is that they need
Speaker 2: for their communities by asking them and then empower them
Speaker 2: to take such action. Right. So not I'm going to
Speaker 2: step in and get all the shine and the glory,
Speaker 2: but I'm going to empower them. So this is the
Speaker 2: difference between what would be known as a white savior
Speaker 2: and a good person an Ally. There you go an ally,
Speaker 2: And before anybody comes at me telling me, why did
Speaker 2: you do a whole show on this white savior, I
Speaker 2: don't think that this guy is at no point that
Speaker 2: I in my research for today's show, that I see
Speaker 2: him insert himself into some circumstances where a black person's
Speaker 2: voice would have carried further, or a black person's actions
Speaker 2: would have meant more, or anything like that. He is
Speaker 2: a businessman who is speaking to corporate interests and economics
Speaker 2: in a space where most of the people that are
Speaker 2: observing what he's doing and finding out what works look
Speaker 2: like him. I call that an ally and if you
Speaker 2: have a problem with that, then you can come see me.
Speaker 2: But I implore you be careful with that one. I don't.
Speaker 2: And that's oh man, I wish that everybody just kind
Speaker 2: of knew that we're all of us. We're all trying
Speaker 2: to get there together. We don't need to tear each
Speaker 2: other down if we get it wrong, you know, not
Speaker 2: just us, anyone. If you get it wrong, talk to
Speaker 2: us to tear it down. Anyway. I'll get back to it.
Speaker 2: So his next slide, he says, oh, let me give
Speaker 2: you a little bit more history. So his his slides
Speaker 2: are a little bit about not just about race. This
Speaker 2: stream of consciousness has a lot to do with race,
Speaker 2: but he's also talking about you know, teachers and education, healthcare,
Speaker 2: you know workers' rights, you know quality of life of course, economics,
Speaker 2: you know business, all that sort of stuff, and standing
Speaker 2: up for the underdog, like he says, so recently put
Speaker 2: up a post that said, eighteen years ago today, I
Speaker 2: started my company, Gravity Payments. I was nineteen years old.
Speaker 2: And just excuse me, just trying to survive. We now
Speaker 2: have over two hundred employees, over fifty million dollars a
Speaker 2: year in revenue, pay everyone a living wage again seventy
Speaker 2: thousand dollars minimum wage at his company, and have never
Speaker 2: had one layoff, he says, My secret great employees, CEOs
Speaker 2: don't matter, workers do. I think that that better identifies
Speaker 2: who he is as a person. And this thing we're
Speaker 2: talking about today is one facet of that. He hasn't
Speaker 2: built his whole identity around, you know, anything like rescuing
Speaker 2: black folks, and even that I take issue with it,
Speaker 2: because if someone did, that was their life's mission. I
Speaker 2: don't think that's the worst thing in the world. I
Speaker 2: do get that some people take issue, and I guess
Speaker 2: I can understand why, But I don't have a problem
Speaker 2: with that.
Speaker 1: Good And I mean, that's that's similar to the conversation
Speaker 1: that you and I had before, Because to outsiders, people's
Speaker 1: intentions matter, right, Oh yeah, But sometimes outcomes should outweigh intentions,
Speaker 1: even if they personally entire mission was to say, hey,
Speaker 1: look at me, I'm awesome. Look at all these black
Speaker 1: people I helped. If we're looking at all the black
Speaker 1: people they helped. Then I don't care that it's clout chasing.
Speaker 1: I don't care that the that their their reason for
Speaker 1: it was to ultimately big themselves up. If the outcomes
Speaker 1: are still righteous, thank you think we had an issue
Speaker 1: Just to give you guys full transparency when we started
Speaker 1: to change society and hashtag lunchbag more specifically one of
Speaker 1: our flagship programs. It's a social media program, hence the
Speaker 1: name hashtag lunch bag, and we got a lot of
Speaker 1: pushback from people saying, hey, get the cameras out of
Speaker 1: those people's faces.
Speaker 2: You know, we were feeding homeless people with this problem.
Speaker 1: Stop saying hey, look at me, I'm so great because
Speaker 1: I'm doing this thing, and just do it. And it's like, sure,
Speaker 1: the five of us could just do it, but by
Speaker 1: sharing it on social media, millions of people all over
Speaker 1: the world got involved. Seventy eighty cities at a time,
Speaker 1: all that once, feeding millions of people because of social media.
Speaker 1: So of course some people came out because it was
Speaker 1: a good look on their Instagram to be seen doing
Speaker 1: something good for people. But the outcomes were still right.
Speaker 1: Those people still got food and meals that they wouldn't
Speaker 1: have gotten and we're talking millions of people.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, so I'll take it. I'm with you there. But
Speaker 2: you know, we so we obviously this show. We created
Speaker 2: this show to be a black show for non black people,
Speaker 2: you know, to create better allies, to empower folks, the
Speaker 2: people that were out on the streets that wanted to
Speaker 2: know where to go, what to do in twenty twenty,
Speaker 2: Where do we go? How do I support? What do
Speaker 2: I put on my sign? What does this mean? What
Speaker 2: does that mean? What is it that you want? How
Speaker 2: can I help? You know? There was nothing talking to
Speaker 2: those people, no show like this in this space, in
Speaker 2: the radio space on these stations that was doing that,
Speaker 2: and so we created this. But again, the conclusion the
Speaker 2: outcomes is more important than anything. And so people come
Speaker 2: at us, you know, because you know, black people listen
Speaker 2: to the show as well, and some folks take issue,
Speaker 2: and that's okay because we don't know everything. But as
Speaker 2: long as the tone is good and positive, then we'll
Speaker 2: all get there. Man, it's a very difficult job to do,
Speaker 2: but I love you all. It doesn't matter who you are,
Speaker 2: what color you're from, or what color where you're from,
Speaker 2: or anything like that. My job is to love you,
Speaker 2: and I'm gonna do my best for you. All right,
Speaker 2: let's get back to these slides, all right, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: burn through a few of these first. Black owned businesses
Speaker 2: get three percent of all business loans. Black people own
Speaker 2: one percent of all stocks. Black people own four percent
Speaker 2: of legal cannabis businesses under one percent of fortune. Five
Speaker 2: hundred CEOs are black women. Scooter startup Bird, you know
Speaker 2: those little scooters in every city. Scooter Startup Bird got
Speaker 2: more funding than all black women upstarts combined in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: In nineteen fifty, black men made fifty one cents for
Speaker 2: every one dollar white men made. Now fifty one since,
Speaker 2: So that means it has not changed. Americans think black
Speaker 2: people have ninety percent of the wealth while white people do.
Speaker 2: Or sorry, americans think black people have ninety percent of
Speaker 2: the wealth white people do. So Americans think black people
Speaker 2: have ninety percent of the wealth of white folks, it's
Speaker 2: actually ten percent. Black homeowners are still five times more
Speaker 2: likely to be in old redlined areas fifty years after
Speaker 2: redlining was outlawed. That is why you need critical race
Speaker 2: theory that you see the legal implications of a system
Speaker 2: that was outlawed and what are the long term implications
Speaker 2: of it? How do systems continually affect you know, these
Speaker 2: communities after the laws have been passed and changed and
Speaker 2: so forth. That is where critical race theory comes into play.
Speaker 2: No one in elementary school is going to learn about this,
Speaker 2: and if they did, they wouldn't look at themselves like, oh,
Speaker 2: my gosh, I'm a bad person. Oh woe is me?
Speaker 2: You know, at least that's my take on it. All right,
Speaker 2: I'll move on. Black Americans are three times more likely
Speaker 2: than white people to be killed by the.
Speaker 4: Police, and more likely, by the way, because three times
Speaker 4: makes it sound small, that's three hundred percent more likely.
Speaker 2: But I like the way you said it better. In
Speaker 2: eight cities, the rate of police killing black men is
Speaker 2: higher than the general US murder rate. Facial recognition is
Speaker 2: one hundred times more likely to misidentify blackfaces than white ones.
Speaker 2: This all came out on the same All these slides
Speaker 2: came out of the same day, so you can imagine
Speaker 2: the impact that it had on me and Q. All right,
Speaker 2: I'll continue. Distributions from corporate stock buybacks and dividends in
Speaker 2: the last fifteen years benefited white people seventy two times
Speaker 2: more than black people. Black owned small businesses were three
Speaker 2: times less likely than white owned businesses to get a
Speaker 2: PPP bill out. Minimum wage workers are twice as likely
Speaker 2: to be black than white. All right, thirty seven percent
Speaker 2: of black families have zero dollars in net worth. I'll
Speaker 2: say that one more time. Thirty seven percent of black
Speaker 2: families have no net worth. That is zero dollars, and
Speaker 2: that's twice the rate of white families. Under the post
Speaker 2: World War two GI bill, point one percent of homes
Speaker 2: went to black military vets. Point one not one percent,
Speaker 2: and ninety nine percent went to everyone else. Point one went.
Speaker 5: To black point went to everybody else, Thank you, yeah,
Speaker 5: ninety nine point nine.
Speaker 2: There it is. Black voters are seventy four percent more
Speaker 2: likely than white voters to wait at least thirty minutes
Speaker 2: at the polls. Oh, I bet they love that on
Speaker 2: the right. All right. Median net worth white families with
Speaker 2: kids sixty eight thousand, eight hundred and thirty eight dollars.
Speaker 2: Read that again. The median net worth of white families
Speaker 2: with kids is sixty three thousand, eight hundred and thirty
Speaker 2: eight dollars. The median net worth of black families with
Speaker 2: kids is eight hundred and eight dollars. So the numbers
Speaker 2: sixty three, eight hundred and thirty eight versus eight hundred
Speaker 2: and eight, so it's over sixty three thousand more dollars.
Speaker 2: And it's not even that that the amount is important,
Speaker 2: it's just it's nothing. So gross network. Yeah, that's crazy,
Speaker 2: And we talked. We talked, I think it was last week,
Speaker 2: we talked about how having money in the house affects
Speaker 2: the brain development for babies. If if a mother who's
Speaker 2: just given birth, a postpartum I think that's what it's called,
Speaker 2: or freshly birthed, you know, seed in the house man,
Speaker 2: their brain develops better when there's fiscal resources. This is
Speaker 2: like a scientific thing we talked about on a previous show.
Speaker 2: Feel free to hit the websites cif E, cipher dot
Speaker 2: com and download it and then our last light here.
Speaker 2: From nineteen thirty to nineteen sixty, one percent of all
Speaker 2: mortgages were issued to black people. Today, homelanders are eighty
Speaker 2: percent more likely to reject a black person's application than
Speaker 2: a white person with the same finances. And finally, black
Speaker 2: millennials net worth is fifty two percent lower and their
Speaker 2: parents at this same age once again. Oh you know
Speaker 2: what before we go about thirty seconds Q. Any final thoughts.
Speaker 5: These numbers are staggering, and just to echo my point
Speaker 5: from before, it's a statistical impossibility for all of these
Speaker 5: truths to be random. It's absolutely intentional, absolutely systemic, and
Speaker 5: absolutely on purpose. And that's the part that.
Speaker 1: Makes it so disgusting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well again, I employ you to check out on
Speaker 2: Twitter at Dan Price Seattle. All the sources for all
Speaker 2: of his statistics are there so you can examine them.
Speaker 2: I looked at the sources too, because I don't want
Speaker 2: to take some nonsense and put it on the radio,
Speaker 2: because then y'all be coming after me and I don't
Speaker 2: need that problem. So check them out for yourself. It
Speaker 2: is very insightful, and I think he'll become a more
Speaker 2: empathetic human being after seeing that, and maybe it'll inspire
Speaker 2: some creativity along the way. Now the way black history
Speaker 2: fact Sidney Poortier. He died earlier this year at age
Speaker 2: ninety four, and I will be reading a bit from
Speaker 2: CNN dot com in their article on that, they wrote,
Speaker 2: after you passed Portier overcame an impoverished background in the
Speaker 2: Bahamas and softened his thick Island Accent, a rise to
Speaker 2: the top of his profession at a time when prominent
Speaker 2: roles for black actors were rare. He won the Oscar
Speaker 2: for nineteen sixty threes Lilies of the Field, in which
Speaker 2: he played an itinerant laborer who helps a group of
Speaker 2: white nuns build the chapel. Many of his best known
Speaker 2: films explored racial tensions as Americans were grappling with social
Speaker 2: changes wrought by the Civil Rights Movement. In nineteen sixty
Speaker 2: seven alone, he appeared as a Philadelphia detective fighting bigotry
Speaker 2: in smalltown, Mississippi in In the Heat of the Night
Speaker 2: and a doctor who wins over his white f Beyonce's
Speaker 2: skeptical parents in Guests Who's Coming to Dinner? That's the
Speaker 2: one I know him for. Quartier's movies struggled for distribution
Speaker 2: in the South that makes sense, and his choice of
Speaker 2: roles was limited to what white run studios would produce.
Speaker 2: Racial tableaus, for example, precluded him for most romantic parts,
Speaker 2: but his dignified roles helped audiences in the fifties and
Speaker 2: sixties envisioned black people not just as servants, but as doctors, teachers,
Speaker 2: and detectives. We got a good one for today. At
Speaker 2: the same time, as the lone black leading man in
Speaker 2: nineteen sixties Hollywood, he came under tremendous scrutiny. He was
Speaker 2: too often held as a noble symbol of his race,
Speaker 2: and endured criticism from some black people who said he
Speaker 2: had betrayed them by taking sanitized roles and pandering to whites.
Speaker 2: It's hard to please everyone, but I do understand. You know,
Speaker 2: black folks, you know people that had been hurt. My
Speaker 2: people been hurt so much that to be critical of
Speaker 2: everything it makes sense. So I just bark. I'm not mad.
Speaker 2: If you guys want to be critical of me, that's okay.
Speaker 2: It's been an enormous responsibility, Poortier told Oprah Winfrey in
Speaker 2: two thousand and I accepted it, and I lived in
Speaker 2: a way that showed how I respected that responsibility. I
Speaker 2: had to in order for others to come behind me.
Speaker 2: There were certain things I had to do. As a
Speaker 2: young actor, he overcame enormous challenges. The youngest of seven children,
Speaker 2: Sydney Poitier, was born several months premature in Miami on
Speaker 2: February twentieth, nineteen twenty seven, so tiny he could fit
Speaker 2: in his father's hand. His parents were tomato farmers who
Speaker 2: often traveled to and from Florida and the Bahamas. He
Speaker 2: was not expected to live. His mother consulted a palm
Speaker 2: reader who assuaged her fears. The lady took her hand
Speaker 2: and started speaking to my mother. Don't worry about your son.
Speaker 2: You will survive, Fortier told CBS News in twenty thirteen.
Speaker 2: And these were her words. She said, he will walk
Speaker 2: with kings. When he was fifteen, Potier's parents sent him
Speaker 2: from the Bahamas to live with an older brother than Miami,
Speaker 2: where they figured they would have better opportunities. Portier didn't
Speaker 2: like Miami, and soon he headed up north to New York,
Speaker 2: where he tried his hand at acting. It did not
Speaker 2: go well at first. With limited schooling, he had trouble
Speaker 2: reading a script, but he got a job as a
Speaker 2: dishwasher in a restaurant, where a fortuitous encounter changed his life.
Speaker 2: An elderly waiter took an interest in the teen and
Speaker 2: spent nights after work reading the newspaper with him to
Speaker 2: improve his comprehension, grammar and punctuation. Fat Man. Every night
Speaker 2: the place closed, everyone's gone, and he sat there with
Speaker 2: me week after week after week, Portier told CBS News,
Speaker 2: and he told me about punctuations. He told me what
Speaker 2: dots were and what dots mean between these two words
Speaker 2: and all that stuff. Soon after, Portier landed work with
Speaker 2: the American Negro Theater, where he took acting lessons soft
Speaker 2: in his Bahaman accent and landed a stage role as
Speaker 2: an understudy to Harry Belafonte. This led to roles on
Speaker 2: Broadway and eventually caught the attention of Hollywood. Portier's first
Speaker 2: movie was nineteen fifties No Way Out Out No I
Speaker 2: Can Never Say noir film, in which he played a
Speaker 2: young doctor who must treat a racist patient. That led
Speaker 2: to increasingly prominent roles as a revered in the apartheid
Speaker 2: drama Cry The Beloved Country, a troubled student in Blackboard Jungle,
Speaker 2: and an escape prisoner in The Defiant Ones, in which
Speaker 2: he and Tony Curtis were shackled together and forced to
Speaker 2: get along to survive. With that nineteen fifty eight film,
Speaker 2: Poitier became the first black man to be nominated for
Speaker 2: an Oscar, but for a dark skinned actor. In the
Speaker 2: nineteen fifties, finding complex roles was difficult. Quote blacks were
Speaker 2: so new in Hollywood, there was almost no frame of
Speaker 2: reference for us except as stereotypical, one dimensional carriers. Poitier
Speaker 2: told Winfrey, I had in mind what was expected of me,
Speaker 2: not just what other blacks expected, but what my mother
Speaker 2: and father expected, and what I expected of myself. Early on,
Speaker 2: Potier made a conscious decision to reach roles that weren't
Speaker 2: consistent with his values or that reflected badly upon his race.
Speaker 2: He told Winfrey that, as a struggling young actor, he
Speaker 2: turned down a role that paid seven hundred and fifty
Speaker 2: dollars a week because he didn't like the character a
Speaker 2: janitor who didn't respond after thugs killed his daughter and
Speaker 2: threw her body on his lawn. Quote I cannot imagine
Speaker 2: playing that part. So I said to myself, that's not
Speaker 2: the kind of work I want. And quote, oh oh sorry,
Speaker 2: that's not the kind of work I want. And told
Speaker 2: my agent that I couldn't play the role. Quote Quotier said.
Speaker 2: He said, why can't you play it? There's nothing derogatory
Speaker 2: about it in racial terms, and I said, I can't
Speaker 2: do it. He never understood, and we don't get to
Speaker 2: talk about all his activism that he did we don't
Speaker 2: get to talk about all the criticism that he received
Speaker 2: from both sides, you know, white folks and black folks.
Speaker 2: He mentioned, you know, the sanitation of his characters. But
Speaker 2: you know, if you want to find out more about
Speaker 2: his awards, about everything, it's just a rich story here.
Speaker 2: Please just seeing in dot com you can read the
Speaker 2: whole thing for yourself. It just really gives you an
Speaker 2: idea of what he had to go through and might
Speaker 2: even paint a slight picture. I mean, we could make
Speaker 2: the case of the sort of things that we have
Speaker 2: to go through here on this show. Now, qute you think, yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 2: we have to play this game too. Where we have
Speaker 2: we can't be too much. And you know, I think
Speaker 2: our hearts are in the right place. We want to
Speaker 2: educate people. We want to love people. I think that
Speaker 2: that's and we want people to love each other. And
Speaker 2: we're in a position to do something. We have the
Speaker 2: skill set, we have the platform, so this is what
Speaker 2: we're doing with it. I mean, we could be making
Speaker 2: money and you know, listening to music and all that
Speaker 2: sort of stuff, you know, and hanging out backstage, you know,
Speaker 2: but those days are over. We have a more meaningful
Speaker 2: journey at this point. So so yeah, if you want
Speaker 2: to find out more, just check out seeing in dot
Speaker 2: Com Sydney Poitier.
Speaker 6: But that is our way, Black his effect. Anything you'd
Speaker 6: like to add before we close, keep continue to follow
Speaker 6: us man. You know, the genesis of this show was
Speaker 6: born of our voices needing to be heard in spaces
Speaker 6: where traditionally they weren't. We never knew that it would
Speaker 6: turn into all that it's turned to. Like Raham just
Speaker 6: said at the start of the show, go on our
Speaker 6: social media is check us out. We got some really,
Speaker 6: really cool and exciting things happening for us right now,
Speaker 6: and it literally is because of you all. So thank
Speaker 6: you guys so much for your support, Thank you for caring.
Speaker 6: Thank you for letting things that might not affect you
Speaker 6: directly mean something to you and allowing those things to
Speaker 6: be important.
Speaker 1: Enough for you to listen to us for a few
Speaker 1: minutes a week.
Speaker 2: You know what. I'm glad you said that, and I
Speaker 2: think that you're right. If you can go check out
Speaker 2: our social media because you'll get the intricate details. But
Speaker 2: I will you know, not every I get it, Not
Speaker 2: everybody does that. Not everybody connects the dots in that way,
Speaker 2: So I'll just kind of let a little bit of
Speaker 2: it be known. Recently, we reached an agreement with iHeartMedia
Speaker 2: to help distribute the show, and so they're going to
Speaker 2: be adding several radio stations to our already bountiful lineup
Speaker 2: of affiliates across the country. Shout out to the PACIFICA Network,
Speaker 2: Shout outs all the independent stations carrying this program, and
Speaker 2: uh yeah, we're we're growing the next because of me
Speaker 2: directly because there's no other line that we can connect.
Speaker 2: So with that said, thank you for listening to the city
Speaker 2: Sack around her house fans with yah and until next week,
Speaker 2: y'all yao.
Speaker 3: We had the Lady, these Brothers, the Fabulous Our Ladies
Speaker 3: show where you move on travels will speak to from
Speaker 3: sunlight to the busting on stage like fight, move my
Speaker 3: mic back like that with journalists too, we can strike
Speaker 3: back hall horb borders with orders from head borders behind
Speaker 3: in the by line side stepping the borders with press passes.
Speaker 2: We bring it to you as it happens.
Speaker 3: The streets love mocking from music and rapping the street
Speaker 3: complaned the slash weak expander. You're going to fight the
Speaker 3: stand up with the proper propaganda. What's happenings hot, You've
Speaker 3: got a questions to ask in Deduce is just a
Speaker 3: TV show you're pasking And this from a quiet wartime.
Speaker 3: Journalists headlines wake up peas and resist like this, like this,
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