Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of Civic Cipher. I'm your host, Rams' John.
Speaker 2: And they call me q Ward I think because that's
Speaker 2: my name, though I think that's why they why they
Speaker 2: called me that.
Speaker 1: I think so too some time. And we're here to
Speaker 1: talk about all of the good things and some of
Speaker 1: the more challenging things about black life in America and
Speaker 1: you know, to a lesser degree, brown native, you know,
Speaker 1: minority life, colored people life. Such a funny word, colored,
Speaker 1: isn't it. I've been the same one color my whole
Speaker 1: life anyway. Yeah, and we have, you know, uh what,
Speaker 1: what I believe is a shared and at the same
Speaker 1: time unique experience living in this country that's not shared
Speaker 1: by you know, the majority, and felt like, you know,
Speaker 1: we should create a space and talk about it. And
Speaker 1: that's what we're doing today. How's your life? How's the
Speaker 1: prospects of this country? How's my life? That is such
Speaker 1: a broad question, wow questions, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Because I was saying to my mom this morning, she said,
Speaker 1: I look like I was running on fumes, and I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 1: but those fumes are my babies. And I think she
Speaker 1: was just trying to point out that I looked tired, okay,
Speaker 1: But the fumes that it look like I'm running on
Speaker 1: a little bit of energy that I have are those
Speaker 1: two beautiful children that I spend all of my days with.
Speaker 1: So how are things or how's life is always a
Speaker 1: complicated question for black people unless you unless you're doing
Speaker 1: so well that you remove yourself from the spectrum of
Speaker 1: the very very real issues that we have to deal
Speaker 1: with by simply existing in this skin, most specifically in
Speaker 1: this country. And I actually heard somebody say something about
Speaker 1: the experience of racism abroad, and I'm absolutely certain that
Speaker 1: it exists. Like the type of people that are racist,
Speaker 1: I'm sure make home every part of this world, but
Speaker 1: the slave trade, the very very holistic system of slavery
Speaker 1: for black people, African people, mostly Western Africa, existed here.
Speaker 1: So our experience with racism is always going to be
Speaker 1: different than even black people in other parts of the
Speaker 1: world because they're not living on land, cultivated, built upon,
Speaker 1: fortified at its foundation by the literal blood, sweating tears
Speaker 1: of our ancestors who were brought here for that sole purpose,
Speaker 1: and you know, subjugated to a view that was I
Speaker 1: think I touched on this before that was widely held
Speaker 1: by the majority of even decent people that we were
Speaker 1: less than human.
Speaker 2: Not just less than them because the cattle that worked
Speaker 2: their land was less than them too, and their dogs
Speaker 2: and their pets or whatever, but we specifically less than human.
Speaker 2: And I think that's the whole basis for race in America,
Speaker 2: not just racism, but race in and of itself.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: I think I told you this story before, and forgive
Speaker 2: me if I'm rambling, but that question just lit all
Speaker 2: my light.
Speaker 1: Bulbs up as it should.
Speaker 2: I was living in Barcelona, Spain. I think this just
Speaker 2: two thousand and ten eleven. Don't quote me, but somewhere
Speaker 2: around there, sure, And at dinner the question was, hey,
Speaker 2: where are you from?
Speaker 1: Someone asked you that, yes, not what race are you?
Speaker 1: Where are you from? Right?
Speaker 2: The only question, the only place in the world where
Speaker 2: someone's going to ask you your race is here?
Speaker 1: Oh wow?
Speaker 2: And even more complicated was my answer on from Detroit
Speaker 2: from the motor You know what I'm saying, motown Let
Speaker 2: him know seven mile to be specific. And the gentleman
Speaker 2: that asked me looked confused, like no, no, no, no, where
Speaker 2: your where's your family from?
Speaker 1: I said, oh, macing, Georgia Bibb County. Talk to them.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, the pre state h and Ah,
Speaker 2: forsythe downtown, come see us, get you a nice plate,
Speaker 2: fried chicken, Kyla Greens, cornbread, kool Aid. And he's thinking Georgia.
Speaker 2: So he's thinking like Eastern European USSR Russia, Georgia. No, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: like Atlanta, but like a little souther Did I.
Speaker 1: Just make up? I like it? Did I just make
Speaker 1: that up?
Speaker 2: A little souther A little souther than Atlanta, small town,
Speaker 2: Bibb County making He said, no, where are you from?
Speaker 2: And y'all can't see me on the radio, but he
Speaker 2: started rubbing his dark brown arm, like where is this from?
Speaker 2: And I was stumped because, like most Black Americans, I
Speaker 2: had zero clue on the where he was talking about.
Speaker 2: Four or five, six generations removed hundreds of years, and
Speaker 2: a very intentional and purpose for disconnection from our ancestry
Speaker 2: has resulted in us.
Speaker 1: Being the only black people in the world where it's
Speaker 1: just black, not you know, Ethiopian or yeah, even where
Speaker 1: it's black at all.
Speaker 2: There's no one at that table would have answered that
Speaker 2: question by saying black, because that question.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't be asked.
Speaker 2: There's no what is your race doesn't exist anywhere else,
Speaker 2: so no one would have asked or answered that question.
Speaker 1: Black.
Speaker 2: Right, there was a gentleman there from Nigeria, a young
Speaker 2: lady from Germany. So a couple of people from Jamaica,
Speaker 2: some other people from Ghana, some other people right from Spain,
Speaker 2: some people from Portugal. And here I am an American, right,
Speaker 2: but that's not where I'm from. And then there's that
Speaker 2: because I'm on my face as soon as they hear
Speaker 2: me speak, oh, he's American. Except that's not the case
Speaker 2: here where I was born, where me and my.
Speaker 1: Mother and her mother and her mother and her mother
Speaker 1: and her mother and her mother.
Speaker 2: Are from, that's not the case. We have to be
Speaker 2: Afro American, Negro African American colored, the other word they
Speaker 2: use that is just the most hateful and harmful and
Speaker 2: ugly word, ugly, you know, term possible. But going through
Speaker 2: this conversation, I was ashamed, you know, almost embarrassed that
Speaker 2: I wasn't able to answer that question. And I'm starting
Speaker 2: to reconcile that there's no utopia for us, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean, there is no version of this where the
Speaker 2: unalienable rights, the birth rights of just being human beings,
Speaker 2: will be afforded to us just on its face, without
Speaker 2: us having to fight for it, and that we will
Speaker 2: not be made to be the villain for fighting for it.
Speaker 2: And that is such a harsh, dark, sad thing to
Speaker 2: say out loud, especially as I'm talking about my beautiful babies.
Speaker 2: But I can't shake the idea that as much progress
Speaker 2: as as we've seemed to make, we're still so close to.
Speaker 1: Where we started, relatively relative to where, you.
Speaker 2: Know, like, if there's a such thing as a finish line,
Speaker 2: we're far closer to where we started.
Speaker 1: See what you're saying. Do you think that that's because
Speaker 1: there are forces that benefit from things being the way
Speaker 1: they are?
Speaker 2: I think that's the singular soul reason. Okay, well, very
Speaker 2: very very very powerful people, it might add, very very
Speaker 2: intelligent people. They scheme this thing pretty brilliantly, you know,
Speaker 2: from the American dream to you know, capitalism. The Mark
Speaker 2: Greeting Department over there at USA, inc. Is incredible, right,
Speaker 2: the same the reasons why those who left Europe and
Speaker 2: came here came here and settled and colonized, The reasons why,
Speaker 2: they say are the same things they deny us life, liberty,
Speaker 2: pursuit of happening. It is all those beautiful words that
Speaker 2: they use when founding this country. Sure, and they use
Speaker 2: their God, their Bible, guns, their guns of sometimes diseases
Speaker 2: and work in their favor, but more specifically their God
Speaker 2: and their Bible to justify the guns and everything else.
Speaker 2: The ideology that led to the guns and the war
Speaker 2: and the colonization and the enslavement. It's in doctrine, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, Like, is it in doctrine or indoctrinated?
Speaker 1: And I think indoctrinated sounds.
Speaker 2: Good to me, and it's deeply embedded in some I
Speaker 2: pointed to the pictures that we saw of a picnic,
Speaker 2: you know, back when, and the pleasant, proud normalcy on
Speaker 2: the faces of the families and even the children in
Speaker 2: those pictures with murdered slaves behind them as they posed
Speaker 2: for this photo. And I suggested to you that there
Speaker 2: may have been, as crazy as this sounds, decent people
Speaker 2: in that picture that absolutely did not understand that they
Speaker 2: were doing something wrong. That sounds crazy. But again, when
Speaker 2: you're taught something from birth by the people that you
Speaker 2: trust the most, right, if somebody came and told us
Speaker 2: that God wasn't real, the Christianity wasn't real, or whatever
Speaker 2: the case. They couldn't present enough evidence for us to
Speaker 2: fold on what we've been taught since we've been in existence.
Speaker 2: Black people more specifically so some of those people, it's
Speaker 2: it's involuntary. They're not actively trying to be racist or suppressive.
Speaker 2: It's just what they've always known. Some of those people
Speaker 2: are very aware that what they're doing is wrong.
Speaker 1: Can I want to add something if I'm in please,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know that there's I don't know
Speaker 1: if I agree, And maybe it's good that I don't
Speaker 1: agree that they're I hope I'm not pulling you over
Speaker 1: to the dark side. No no, no, no, no, listen, listen
Speaker 1: what I'm saying that we are. I don't agree that
Speaker 1: we're like stuck in the woods and in the mucky
Speaker 1: we can't get out of it. That I know, ladies
Speaker 1: and gentlemen, I thought I'll pulled him over to the
Speaker 1: dark side. No no, no, no, no no. But I'm glad
Speaker 1: that you say that, because you know, I think that
Speaker 1: I often see the best in people, and I you know,
Speaker 1: my brain always tries to figure out Okay, well, if
Speaker 1: we did this, or if this happened, or if this
Speaker 1: shifted a bit, then you know, things will move forward.
Speaker 1: I believe in the greater good of humanity. Right. A
Speaker 1: lot of people pursue money because money is an excellent
Speaker 1: placeholder for happiness. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: everybody wants to be happy. And one thing that science
Speaker 1: has proven true time and again is that you're happiest
Speaker 1: when you're in service to other people, voluntarily being in
Speaker 1: service to people. And to me, from that, I deduce
Speaker 1: that we're at our best as humans. We're at our happiest,
Speaker 1: our highest of highs, when we are kind to each other,
Speaker 1: when we love each other, and so forth. Right, But
Speaker 1: for now, the prevailing philosophy, ideology, et cetera is, let's
Speaker 1: get this money right, Well, which comes first, the chicken
Speaker 1: or the egg? Well, we are not as a species,
Speaker 1: are not there yet? No, we believe that that.
Speaker 2: But my question being, are we most happy? So then
Speaker 2: we serve others? Or do we serve that cause the
Speaker 2: happiness is?
Speaker 1: That's what? So the second to answer your question, that's
Speaker 1: what my understanding is if people who are looking for
Speaker 1: happiness like they're just they have all the money in
Speaker 1: the world, they've accomplished everything, they've traveled, done everything, and
Speaker 1: they still feel empty inside. Will ultimately find that when
Speaker 1: they care for a child that has been abandoned, or
Speaker 1: when they feed someone who cannot feed themselves, or when
Speaker 1: they you know, like what you and I do with
Speaker 1: hashtag lunchback for those who don't know, Q and I.
Speaker 1: We have a nonprofit and we feed people and we
Speaker 1: provide a forum for volunteers to come and have that
Speaker 1: experience but also to you know, make a small difference.
Speaker 1: But you know, these sorts of things, you know, we
Speaker 1: do sock drives and water drives, and you know, you
Speaker 1: know all the people they would say thank you, They
Speaker 1: would come up to you and say they had ten
Speaker 1: years worth of pictures of that, you know, and video.
Speaker 1: That's when, more often than not, human beings are at
Speaker 1: their happiest. You know. That's not to say that money
Speaker 1: doesn't make people happy, but there's a certain point where
Speaker 1: it doesn't make you any happier. And that point is
Speaker 1: eighty thousand dollars per year. So once you get to
Speaker 1: eighty thousand dollars, your eighty thousand and first dollar will
Speaker 1: not make you relatively, it won't make you that much happier,
Speaker 1: you know. It kind of flattens out right around there.
Speaker 1: So you can make eighty million dollars a year, and
Speaker 1: you won't be any happier than the guy who or
Speaker 1: a girl who makes a woman sorry, who makes eighty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars a year, and so money as the pursuit.
Speaker 1: Like you said, it's been very much indoctrinated into our
Speaker 1: culture and into our minds. But I wanted to say
Speaker 1: something because you did. You spoke about these people at
Speaker 1: this picnic, and I remember that picture. I'll never forget it.
Speaker 1: You know, there's two pictures that I remember the rest
Speaker 1: of my life. One is the picture of the slave
Speaker 1: with his back all whipped up, and it's it's a
Speaker 1: thick scab of a back, his whole back. Those of
Speaker 1: you listening to me who are black, you might relate
Speaker 1: to that. And to know that that's what you came from,
Speaker 1: that's a very sad thing to know that that's your legacy.
Speaker 1: You know. We look at movies and you see like
Speaker 1: all these you know, kings and all of this like
Speaker 1: great these great you know whatever on the movies, and
Speaker 1: they're all white. And then that's your history, and then
Speaker 1: ours is these photographs of these slaves, and it's like, man,
Speaker 1: you guys got so much to be proud of. Now.
Speaker 1: Of course we know that we did come from you know,
Speaker 1: full well fleshed out societies, you know, with kings and queens,
Speaker 1: and also with folks who maybe did not they weren't,
Speaker 1: they were just common folks. But you know when when
Speaker 1: when you look at those photos and you realize that,
Speaker 1: you know, at least this chapter of our history as
Speaker 1: a people was born out of that, out of a
Speaker 1: whipped up back and a charred body that's kind of
Speaker 1: folded in to try to escape the flame, and then
Speaker 1: it's cooked to a crisp and you can see the panic,
Speaker 1: and you can see the human form has seized in
Speaker 1: a defensive position to try to get away from the fire.
Speaker 1: They burn this man alive, and there's a photograph of
Speaker 1: it and children standing there. It's a lot to stomach.
Speaker 1: And again, if you're listening, this is part of the
Speaker 1: reason why you might see black people celebrate blackness in
Speaker 1: a way where maybe you think black people are doing
Speaker 1: the most. You know, it's because it's necessary for me.
Speaker 1: Every time I see someone black who's a black male.
Speaker 1: You could be your birthday, it could just be you thinking,
Speaker 1: you little fly. You could be shirtless, you could be whatever.
Speaker 1: I'll put a crown on the picture because I think
Speaker 1: that it's important to uplift people in that way. And
Speaker 1: that's something that you know, my friends come in all colors,
Speaker 1: you know, it's something that largely is relocated to Black people.
Speaker 1: And I do use it for my Hispanic brothers and
Speaker 1: sisters because there's such thing as Latin King's I know
Speaker 1: that too. But that's where I believe humanity. If we
Speaker 1: if we all take each other and put our put
Speaker 1: each other in the same group, that's where there's the
Speaker 1: greatest need for, you know, the reminder that you're special,
Speaker 1: that you come from special things. Anyway, So this photo
Speaker 1: and this picnic, when you said that there were decent
Speaker 1: folks out there, you know, I agree. You know, one
Speaker 1: of the things that one of the experiences that we're
Speaker 1: able to have. Before we started the show Civic Cipher,
Speaker 1: which by the way, if you're just tuning in, I'm
Speaker 1: your host Rams' job. They called me q Ward and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we're talking about black life in America, as
Speaker 1: we do. But fortunately One of the things we were
Speaker 1: able to do was get out and see a good
Speaker 1: part of the country. Now you had already been around
Speaker 1: the country, but you know, in twenty twenty, I was
Speaker 1: able to go to every state, and I spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time in the Midwest because there's a lot
Speaker 1: of Midwest and interactive with a lot of trump boats.
Speaker 1: I knew they were trump boats. They were not shy
Speaker 1: about it. They're very proud of it in fact, and yeah,
Speaker 1: same thing, man, they're decent folks, you know, they just
Speaker 1: it almost is like you feel bad, like, man, you guys,
Speaker 1: you've been lied to. You're not this person, you know,
Speaker 1: but you think that you need to be in order
Speaker 1: because it serves your you know whatever. But that's not
Speaker 1: even the point I wanted to make. There's this, it's
Speaker 1: kind of hard to say it, but you know, if
Speaker 1: you're white, I would imagine I'm not white. But if
Speaker 1: you are, and you look at history the way it's
Speaker 1: been given to you, then you look like you are
Speaker 1: the great conquerors. You come from a long line of
Speaker 1: conquerors and folks that have created this modern world with
Speaker 1: skyscrapers and television sets and everything. Right, and then you
Speaker 1: look at everyone else, like all these people are so ungrateful,
Speaker 1: they're always complaining. All these women want rights, and all
Speaker 1: these gay people and all black blacks, all the blacks.
Speaker 1: You know, why don't they just not do crimes and
Speaker 1: they won't get shot by the police. You know, if
Speaker 1: only right and this is you know why, and if
Speaker 1: and if they really want to go back to it,
Speaker 1: then you know, well we'll take all the white inventions
Speaker 1: and leave them with their peanut butter and we can
Speaker 1: just call it square. Right, Sure, these are these are real,
Speaker 1: These are real thoughts that really I've seen it expressed
Speaker 1: out loud. I've heard it expressed out loud. But the
Speaker 1: thing is, if you've been sold a lie or a
Speaker 1: half truth or whatever, then that have to be what
Speaker 1: it is. But the funny thing about it is the
Speaker 1: way the human brain works is there's a such thing
Speaker 1: as cognitive dissonance. It's very difficult to take in new
Speaker 1: information when you have already built your reality in its
Speaker 1: entirety around whatever you've built it around, doesn't matter how
Speaker 1: true or false or right or wrong it is, it's
Speaker 1: just very difficult to let that go. And so you're right,
Speaker 1: there are some folks who probably were standing in those
Speaker 1: pictures of that man who was burned alive at that
Speaker 1: picnic back in nineteen thirty or whenever that photo was taken,
Speaker 1: who thought that they were They're fine. You know, this
Speaker 1: man that we burned probably shouldn't have been whistling at
Speaker 1: a white woman. No, that's immatil. But you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, like, just yeah, how dare he? You know, whatever,
Speaker 1: he was out passed sundown or whatever reason that they
Speaker 1: came up with. We call it, for those listening, we
Speaker 1: call it being black and nearby. So you know, I
Speaker 1: would say probably like half the crimes or whatever, it's
Speaker 1: just a result of being black and nearby. If you're
Speaker 1: the close enough person who looks black, you know, they
Speaker 1: can get you on some trumped up charges anyway, pun intended. Wow,
Speaker 1: very good. So you know, and another thing, you know,
Speaker 1: this idea of white supremacy has its origins in I
Speaker 1: believe it might be like Greek philosophy or something like
Speaker 1: that Roman Greek, something like that. I want to say Plato,
Speaker 1: but it could have been Aristotle or one of those
Speaker 1: guys you know, encountered once upon a time, folks from Africa,
Speaker 1: you know, and he just didn't think highly of these
Speaker 1: African people. He didn't think highly of their African features,
Speaker 1: he didn't think highly of their whatever. He considered himself
Speaker 1: to be like super enlightened, not recognizing that a lot
Speaker 1: of the knowledge that he was taught came from those
Speaker 1: same Africans. So the respect wasn't there. There's this disconnect
Speaker 1: of as I mentioned, white folks, they'll take stuff historically.
Speaker 1: I'm not talking to you if you're white and listening,
Speaker 1: but historically there's a pattern. It's well established. Google is
Speaker 1: free of white folks taking things from Africa, really black folks,
Speaker 1: you know, in a much larger sense. But Africa is
Speaker 1: the source of all of this and making it their own.
Speaker 1: You know, if you worship Jesus, guess where Jesus comes from.
Speaker 1: I'm not lying to you. I'm not the whole Bible.
Speaker 1: In fact, all them stories you know, Old Testament, you know,
Speaker 1: shout out to my Jewish brothers and sisters. But you know,
Speaker 1: for those who know, you know the truth. Those stories
Speaker 1: are just stories that were based on the oral tradition
Speaker 1: of human beings. We're just retold and retold and repackaged
Speaker 1: and so forth. But you know, there's a I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna go with Plato, don't hold me to it. But
Speaker 1: you know, he says he didn't like Africans, he didn't
Speaker 1: like their features, he didn't you know whatever. And this
Speaker 1: was in one of his like writings or something like that,
Speaker 1: and somehow made it a point to just kind of whatever.
Speaker 1: And then and then, you know, people listen to this
Speaker 1: guy so because he's the enlightened one, because he's this
Speaker 1: great philosopher of his time. And then you know, when
Speaker 1: he passes away, his books are going to be, you
Speaker 1: know whatever, his writings, his teachings and so forth. That's
Speaker 1: really the earliest recorded instance of there being oh there's
Speaker 1: a different group of people, and we are better than them,
Speaker 1: or they are worse than us, right, less than us,
Speaker 1: less than us. Right. So you know, if you take
Speaker 1: that and you you know, multiply it times infinity and
Speaker 1: take it to the depths of forever, and you end
Speaker 1: up with sort of what we have now. Because you know,
Speaker 1: there's been a lot of folks, as you mentioned, I've
Speaker 1: taken that ball and run with it and marketed it
Speaker 1: very well, you know, and you know, here we are.
Speaker 1: But fortunately, you know, again, I believe that because there's
Speaker 1: a drive for us to all be happy. There's I
Speaker 1: think a natural tendency for us to be brothers and sisters. Granted,
Speaker 1: there are outliers. Some of them are brilliant. You know,
Speaker 1: whoever this person was, Plato, Aristotle, or whoever he was,
Speaker 1: he clearly was a brilliant man because there's so much
Speaker 1: that he contributed to, you know, history, right. It just
Speaker 1: also happened to be very racist, not unlike Hitler. You
Speaker 1: know R. Kelly sang a bunch of dope songs, but
Speaker 1: he's a child molester, you know what I'm like. So,
Speaker 1: you know most of the first presidents of this great
Speaker 1: country who owned slaves. Yeah, you know, there you go.
Speaker 1: So the thing is understanding, recognizing, and you know, you know,
Speaker 1: once upon a time there was no division. Once upon
Speaker 1: time everybody went to Africa to get you know, books,
Speaker 1: and you know, if you've ever heard of tim Book two,
Speaker 1: you've heard of the Library of Alexandria, You've heard of
Speaker 1: in all these places this you know, the the oldest
Speaker 1: recorded history was in Africa, in Egypt, you know, so,
Speaker 1: and that's very African. In case you didn't know, a
Speaker 1: lot of folks think of Egypt as the Middle East,
Speaker 1: not that's Africa, hyper Africa. But uh, you know, there's
Speaker 1: there's another thing that you mentioned too about how we
Speaker 1: if we go abroad, right, there's a you know, we
Speaker 1: don't feel like this this country really doesn't feel like
Speaker 1: the right answer when you say, when you answer that question,
Speaker 1: where are you from? Right, because they're looking for like
Speaker 1: where are your roots? Right?
Speaker 2: Well, specifically not the right answer because that's with the
Speaker 2: exception of our Aboriginal native that's the it's not the
Speaker 2: right answer for anyone.
Speaker 1: That's true. I know what you mean. You know what
Speaker 1: I mean. So they're looking at me.
Speaker 2: I don't look Aboriginal to this soil, So they've already
Speaker 2: disqualified the fact that I'm native through ethnicity American, right,
Speaker 2: So they were waiting for me to say Sierra Leone,
Speaker 2: the Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria. That's what they're waiting for,
Speaker 2: because that has to be it, right Detroit, No, man,
Speaker 2: that's just a city over there where you where your
Speaker 2: people from, where your grandma stay.
Speaker 1: And you did a test you said you were what
Speaker 1: was it? Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Central America is incredible to me,
Speaker 1: you know, But like eighty percent. That's heavy African.
Speaker 2: But that's one test done by somebody I've never seen, right,
Speaker 2: So at as proud as I was to see those results,
Speaker 2: I want more.
Speaker 1: I need to know more. I need to go to
Speaker 1: Africa and have a test done. See you know what
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 2: I want to know where my people are from, Like
Speaker 2: where I can pull up to, not this country on
Speaker 2: this continent I've never been to, Like what village, what tribe,
Speaker 2: what people specifically am I from? Yeah, so I can
Speaker 2: go see my family.
Speaker 1: So I can go see my people.
Speaker 2: So I can take my children to see Right, because
Speaker 2: my children's mother, she knows exactly where she's from. She
Speaker 2: can drive there, We can drive there, and my kids
Speaker 2: can see where part of their heritage started. Dad can't
Speaker 2: do that, and that sucks. So that's where I was
Speaker 2: going with this.
Speaker 1: What an incredible feeling, an inspired feeling to know that
Speaker 1: there's history, you know, and there's a lot of folks
Speaker 1: that have that and they don't really care about it
Speaker 1: because they have it. But when you don't have it,
Speaker 1: when you know your dad and your grandfather and maybe
Speaker 1: his dad's name, and that's it. And I never I
Speaker 1: never met, never met three of my grandparents, not great
Speaker 1: grands My mother and father's parents I've only met, and
Speaker 1: I only know one of them. My mother's mother never
Speaker 1: saw or met my mother's father, never saw or met
Speaker 1: my father's parents. So so my disconnect starts immediately, right right,
Speaker 1: And that's that's not that's not unusual for you know folks,
Speaker 1: black folks in this country where it's like, look, man,
Speaker 1: it's just not really. I mean, think of how they
Speaker 1: keep records of cattle, you know who. They don't really
Speaker 1: track the bloodlines like that. They might a couple of them,
Speaker 1: but for the most part, it's just cattle. You know,
Speaker 1: they get out there, one of them gets pregnant, you know, cool,
Speaker 1: we got another one. So that's slavery. Basically, it was
Speaker 1: like it's all mixed up. You know where you're from. No,
Speaker 1: you all speak the same language. So your culture gets
Speaker 1: washed away, erased immediately, and so there's nothing to grab onto.
Speaker 1: There's no richness of there's no cultural identity, there's none
Speaker 1: of that. And so what ends up happening is dig
Speaker 1: this your home, de facto home identity culturally and otherwise
Speaker 1: becomes your city and to a larger extent, your country
Speaker 1: and That's why for me at least, I have such
Speaker 1: conflicted feelings about the flag of the United States of America.
Speaker 1: How dare you Well, I'll let me explain my ials.
Speaker 1: Let me explain my feelings. How dare you have conflicted
Speaker 1: feelings about this flag that symbolizes this country that mass abducted, kidnapped,
Speaker 1: wholesale rape and pillage of your entire family tree? How
Speaker 1: dare you have.
Speaker 2: Any conflicted emotions about the land that are free and
Speaker 2: the home of the brave ramses.
Speaker 1: You sound like the people that were talking to Kaepernick.
Speaker 1: It's not about the flag, per se. Man, It's about
Speaker 1: I got the flag. But yeah, so I was about
Speaker 1: to ask some more to that and everybody, I can't
Speaker 1: say the next part. So anyway, I got the flag.
Speaker 1: So yeah, what happens is, you know, we're all If
Speaker 1: I was to put it like seriously, like and I
Speaker 1: was to be dramatic, I would say we were all indoctrinated.
Speaker 1: But we all, you know, went to schools as children.
Speaker 1: We all had pleasure allusion to the flag of the
Speaker 1: United S to have to stare at that thing, you know,
Speaker 1: and as a symbol sang the national anthem and as
Speaker 1: a symbol minus a verse. Oh, yeah, that should make
Speaker 1: your stomach China. I know what you're talking about. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: We have talked about it. I mean, I guess we
Speaker 2: have to ignore that though, right, That's what I'm me
Speaker 2: And that's that's part of it. Bro, Like, it's not
Speaker 2: just the verse. I brought the verse up kind of
Speaker 2: and just it's not just the verse. It's exactly what
Speaker 2: you said. We're asked to ignore something that no other
Speaker 2: people would be asked to ignore. No other people in
Speaker 2: the history of Earth would have been and or have
Speaker 2: been asked to ignore anything even similar to what our
Speaker 2: people have gone through in this country. But they insist
Speaker 2: that we forget it and leave it alone. It happened
Speaker 2: so many years ago. What's wrong with you guys? Oh,
Speaker 2: we're not going to acknowledge our part in it or apologize.
Speaker 2: How dare you ask that of us? But you need
Speaker 2: to get over it, Ramses, Okay, it happened. No one
Speaker 2: that's alive now owned slaves, and you were never a slave.
Speaker 2: So I don't understand your problem.
Speaker 1: Oh I could answer that all day. Please don't come
Speaker 1: in me like that, because I know what I'm talking
Speaker 1: about In fact, we'll get to that, but let me
Speaker 1: let me, let me get back to this flag. Good
Speaker 1: and bad things from a black man's perspective or a
Speaker 1: black person's perspective have happened under that flag. You know,
Speaker 1: there's a time when you recognize that, you know, you
Speaker 1: live in a place that has no love for you.
Speaker 1: And then there's a time when you take up arms
Speaker 1: and you go and you fight a war and your countrymen,
Speaker 1: they're your brothers, and you have a common enemy. And
Speaker 1: that's what it is, right that this has happened. Just
Speaker 1: let me get that. Just let me have that. Okay,
Speaker 1: I see your face, cue, just let me have it.
Speaker 1: But more recently, you know, the flag is has been
Speaker 1: you used by folks who wanted to signify that they're patriotic.
Speaker 1: That's me putting it mildly, that this is their country
Speaker 1: and they're proud of their country and so forth right,
Speaker 1: And anyone who is critical of the country and wants
Speaker 1: the country to do better is should just move go
Speaker 1: to another place, right. And these are the people that
Speaker 1: wave their flags, you know, really tall. They put them
Speaker 1: on their trucks and put them in front of their houses.
Speaker 1: And I thought I always thought that was super bizarre,
Speaker 1: because why would you put your flag up in the
Speaker 1: country where you where everybody like, It's not like somebody's
Speaker 1: here and they're like, what country am I in? You know,
Speaker 1: I wish there was a flag to remind me where
Speaker 1: I'm at, because I have no idea, you know, if
Speaker 1: you're in and you know, you and I we live
Speaker 1: in Arizona, So it's not like we just pulled up
Speaker 1: to the coast. You know, we're in the middle. You know,
Speaker 1: we're in the good ways into the to the heart
Speaker 1: of the country. So when you see those flags, usually
Speaker 1: it to me it's a person who's trying to suggest
Speaker 1: that this is our country, and I'm showing it to you,
Speaker 1: the people who don't who live here but don't look
Speaker 1: like me, that we are the true owners, if you will,
Speaker 1: in this country. But this flag is our by definition
Speaker 1: and tone. The word ours doesn't word the word we,
Speaker 1: and the word us very exclusive terms not inclusive, doesn't
Speaker 1: include the inclusive we. But no, no, no, no, we yeah,
Speaker 1: not y'all. All right, So that's how it looks. And
Speaker 1: and you know, far be it for me to say
Speaker 1: that everybody that waves the flag is on that. But
Speaker 1: if I'm being frank, If I see somebody with a flag,
Speaker 1: the immediate assumption on my end is that they're racist,
Speaker 1: and I don't interact with them. May as well be
Speaker 1: a trumpet. I'm never gonna talk to that person because
Speaker 1: they've made up their mind about my value and they're
Speaker 1: where where my life and my liberty lies on their priorities,
Speaker 1: so they don't even look at me as a countryman.
Speaker 1: My assumption is that they oftentimes would feel like the
Speaker 1: world would be a better place if I was not around.
Speaker 1: And of course that's not to say always true. Hang on,
Speaker 1: let me say this. That's not to say that, you know,
Speaker 1: they can't be rehabilitated, that's not to say that they
Speaker 1: can't find their way through that mess. It's just this
Speaker 1: now is not the time for me to put myself
Speaker 1: in the line of fire. So if you wave in
Speaker 1: that flag to get the desired effect, it's working because
Speaker 1: you know, you will have one less friend because Ramses
Speaker 1: is not coming to shake your hand, you know. But
Speaker 1: that same flag, and this is why I say it's conflicted,
Speaker 1: that same flag. Let me sit and watch the right movie,
Speaker 1: you know. Let me see my son in his classroom
Speaker 1: with all the other you know, kindergarteners. I got a gardener.
Speaker 1: He put his little hand on his heart. I pledge
Speaker 1: allegiance to the flag, you know, Like I said, those
Speaker 1: movies at the end of it, when the good guy
Speaker 1: wins and the military movies or whatever, and you see
Speaker 1: the old glory, that sense of pride is very much
Speaker 1: in me. I love that flag and I love this country.
Speaker 1: I went to a restaurant, a Texas restaurant, right, and
Speaker 1: you know, Texas is kind of one of them good
Speaker 1: old boys states, you know, so Texas, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, It is the epitome man of the good
Speaker 1: old boy state, right, see epitome. But you know, and
Speaker 1: and it was playing up that Texas stuff. So there's
Speaker 1: like dead animals on the wall and a bunch of
Speaker 1: Texas paraphernalia and all that sort of stuff, and you
Speaker 1: know whatever posters or whatever. So you walk in there
Speaker 1: and you feel like, uh, oh, this is not the
Speaker 1: place for me, right, But once you settle in, at
Speaker 1: least this is what was my experience. I was like,
Speaker 1: you know what. The lady came, took my order, she
Speaker 1: was nice, you know, Uh, it just was Texas. It
Speaker 1: just was what it was, unapologetically Texas, and there's a
Speaker 1: beauty in that that it's hard to explain, especially to
Speaker 1: somebody like u Q, but it's what keeps me remaining
Speaker 1: hopeful like that. You know, Texas is here in Texas
Speaker 1: is messed up, Florida's messed up, and you know, but
Speaker 1: it's it's my It's like your homie that don't get
Speaker 1: it ever right, but you just like Ed. That's my homie. Man.
Speaker 1: We've been rolling together since the beginning. I don't like
Speaker 1: them either, but I love them, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So that's what I mean when I say when I
Speaker 1: see the flag, there's like conflicted feelings because it's like
Speaker 1: it's like it's family. It's like they'll get it together.
Speaker 1: They have to. There's there, you know, that's the only
Speaker 1: outcome here. We're gonna have to get it right. And
Speaker 1: you know you said you said something earlier. This is
Speaker 1: my belief. I know that your belief is that you know,
Speaker 1: not necessarily we can just keep it running like this
Speaker 1: the rich day rich, and the oppressors keep oppressing and
Speaker 1: then we just keep running in circles. That sound more.
Speaker 2: That sounds about right, right, But because we only got
Speaker 2: a thousand years.
Speaker 1: Of But here's why. There's why I would challenge that,
Speaker 1: go for it. If you really felt that, I don't
Speaker 1: think that you would have a radio show called Civic
Speaker 1: Cipher that you come up and you prepare for every week,
Speaker 1: and that you come and you contribute what I believe
Speaker 1: is meaningful dialogue to the city to strengthen it and
Speaker 1: the cities rather, and to strengthen these communities, and to
Speaker 1: fortify them, and to empower allies, and to inform people
Speaker 1: who might be in a more adversarial position. I do
Speaker 1: believe that all of those things fall underneath your wheelhouse.
Speaker 1: So on some level you have to believe in that
Speaker 1: the greater good will prevail. Otherwise that wasn't meant to
Speaker 1: be like checkmate, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2: It made me pause. But the honest to goodness truth
Speaker 2: is I have not given up on humanity as a whole.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: But in every aspect of our life, we use the
Speaker 2: data that's been presented to us, sure to form sometimes
Speaker 2: pre data hypotheses. You know, we have a control group,
Speaker 2: we have an experiment, we track the data. We then
Speaker 2: look to see if we proved or disproved our hypothesis
Speaker 2: correct in two cases. We ignore the data, okay, right,
Speaker 2: relationships love, we ignore all the data. Sure, right, If
Speaker 2: any anyone listening to me right now, I know what
Speaker 2: you mean. If you're single, one hundred percent of your
Speaker 2: relationships have failed, you ignore that data whenever you decide
Speaker 2: to fall in love with someone else. Right, So when
Speaker 2: it comes to love and romance, we ignore data. And
Speaker 2: when it comes to this dream that.
Speaker 1: We have that our ancestors had, that they fought and
Speaker 1: died for. Right. So that's my civic cipher testimony. My mother,
Speaker 1: when she became of today's voting age, was not allowed
Speaker 1: to So when I went to vote for our first
Speaker 1: black president, my tears came from that. My mom couldn't
Speaker 1: have done this when she was this age.
Speaker 2: My mother, not my grandmother, not my great grandmother, my
Speaker 2: mom one generation ago, who's listening, by the way, you know,
Speaker 2: could not in the great state of Georgia, cast her
Speaker 2: vote when she became of age to do so.
Speaker 1: My mom was born in the forties, so black women
Speaker 1: got the right to vote. And when.
Speaker 2: I typically know that, off the top of my head,
Speaker 2: looked at it because that is something, as you can tell,
Speaker 2: very very specifically important to me, however, So it's because
Speaker 2: of them that I know.
Speaker 1: That what we do is necessary.
Speaker 2: Sure, but God ain't never asked me to ignore the
Speaker 2: things that I can see. Right, I Once a day,
Speaker 2: and I'm not being hyperbolic, I'm not exaggerating. Once a day,
Speaker 2: I see something happen where I have to say, and
Speaker 2: then I have to pull back because I'm annoyed that
Speaker 2: I'm saying it. Man, if that person was black, and
Speaker 2: then I.
Speaker 1: Have to stop.
Speaker 2: Because whoever I'm talking to, if I'm on somebody's comment section,
Speaker 2: if I'm in a group chat, if I'm sitting in
Speaker 2: front of you, whoever I'm talking to already knows how
Speaker 2: to finish the sentence that I'm starting. That part is
Speaker 2: so crushing, and it's and it started to be that
Speaker 2: way with trivial things, right. Sure, people, if you're on
Speaker 2: the internet at all, if you wear Nikes at all,
Speaker 2: you see that the top executive at Nike was allowed
Speaker 2: to step down over the last couple of days after
Speaker 2: it was discovered that her son was making hundreds of
Speaker 2: thousands of dollars reselling Nike shoes. And if you are
Speaker 2: a sneaker head, you are very familiar with the Sneakers app.
Speaker 1: This kid's mother oversaw that app. Now the ramses that
Speaker 1: might not mean anything, but to any of my sneaker
Speaker 1: heads who are listening, it means everything. Every time your
Speaker 1: favorite shoe comes out and you try to get it
Speaker 1: and Sneakers tells you, ah, you didn't get it because
Speaker 1: the demand for the shoe is so high and so
Speaker 1: many people want it, well, a high percentage. Those people
Speaker 1: don't want that shoe because they love the shoe. They
Speaker 1: want it because they know you love it, So they
Speaker 1: buy it at retail let's just say, one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty dollars, and then they resell it at one hundred
Speaker 1: two hundred, three hundred, one thousand percent markup and make
Speaker 1: a very very comfortable living doing so. Now, if that
Speaker 1: mother and that son were black, that would be criminal
Speaker 1: that the lady in charge of that app her son
Speaker 1: gets every shoe resells them for hundreds of thousands of
Speaker 1: dollars in profit. Right, it could be akin to insider trading,
Speaker 1: uses her credit card to buy them. So it's not
Speaker 1: even like we're pretending or hiding here her names on
Speaker 1: the purchase of her product that's being resold. By her
Speaker 1: son for hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit, and
Speaker 1: she gets to just step down, and I'm absolutely certain
Speaker 1: we'll land on her feet continue to be a professional
Speaker 1: in a very very high ranking capacity. Her son will not.
Speaker 2: Be even urged or suggested to give any of that
Speaker 2: money back to any of those people that they took
Speaker 2: advantage of. Right, And it's a very trivial kind of
Speaker 2: man that's messed up that happens story when the people
Speaker 2: don't look like us. Meanwhile, the chairman West Side of
Speaker 2: Chicago Black Panther Party sent to prison before he was
Speaker 2: murdered for stealing ice cream. I think seventy dollars worth prison,
Speaker 2: never even proven that he did it. So the way
Speaker 2: that this world treats us shapes how I feel about it.
Speaker 2: You know, you talk about complication, you talk about that pride.
Speaker 2: I see our Olympians wrap that flag around themselves when
Speaker 2: we go and conquer at the Olympics. So then we
Speaker 2: come back here, I I know that treatment don't stop.
Speaker 2: Those war veterans that are arming arm with their brothers
Speaker 2: over there. They come back here, they're still spit on,
Speaker 2: they're still disrespected, they're still homeless, unemployed. There's still that
Speaker 2: hard er still with the colors on, with the badges on.
Speaker 1: Even our blue lives that matter so much, they get
Speaker 1: to murder them, and that story just goes away. They
Speaker 1: stormed the capital of the United States of America, they
Speaker 1: waved the Confederacy in the Capitol building. They murdered a
Speaker 1: police officer on camera. Blue lives didn't matter no more,
Speaker 1: Just like if it's opposed to them, that flag that
Speaker 1: they go crazy over didn't matter no more. They they
Speaker 1: wasn't waving old Glory in there, They're waving a Confederate
Speaker 1: flag in there. This still ours, that same exclusive hour,
Speaker 1: that same exclusive we This is still ours. And the
Speaker 1: people that we elect to represent us slapped him on
Speaker 1: the hand. Shame on, you brought no charges. We get shot, killed,
Speaker 1: beat pepper sprayed for simply saying that we matter. So
Speaker 1: maybe people listening and me can understand, Well, I don't
Speaker 1: have all that hope and glimmer in my eyes because
Speaker 1: when I look at your babies in mind, those beautiful
Speaker 1: brown babies, I see Christian turning into a beautiful brown
Speaker 1: young man, and I will watch the way that this
Speaker 1: country goes from all he's so cute too. He should
Speaker 1: have just obeyed the officer. That will never happen, That
Speaker 1: will never happen. That'll never happen. But one hundred percent
Speaker 1: of us feel that way. That will never happen. One
Speaker 1: hundred percent of us feel that that would never happen.
Speaker 1: Two hours.
Speaker 2: All these mothers who we pray for, all these hashtags,
Speaker 2: all these T shirts, all those parents taught these lessons
Speaker 2: in war this country with pride. I used to stand
Speaker 2: with my hand on my chest as a college football player,
Speaker 2: listening to those songs and the Jets flying over in
Speaker 2: the flagwave, and I felt that pride swell up. When
Speaker 2: I left Bowling Green State University and ventured off into
Speaker 2: this world. I got reminded often enough that they're not
Speaker 2: talking about us, and it isn't the best interest of
Speaker 2: too many people with too much power, too much in
Speaker 2: the onesn't too much money, for this system to continue
Speaker 2: the way that it is, rather than conform or reform
Speaker 2: to a world where we're seeing as equal. Because I
Speaker 2: want you to do well, but I don't want you
Speaker 2: to do so well that it puts my well being
Speaker 2: at risk, my livelihood, and it doesn't, of course not right.
Speaker 2: But I'm gonna think this way. I'm gonna make sure
Speaker 2: my children think this way so that it never comes
Speaker 2: to be, so that it's never even a real conversation.
Speaker 2: So I'm never even actually afraid or threatened or the
Speaker 2: way that I pretend to Yeah, the way that I
Speaker 2: pretend to be when I tear you and yours.
Speaker 1: Down, Well said Q. Let me fill in a couple
Speaker 1: of gaps here. You mentioned Christian For those who don't know.
Speaker 2: That kid is beautiful and incredible and brilliant, and you
Speaker 2: can't help but be happy if he's around you.
Speaker 1: I don't care how hard your day is going. If
Speaker 1: he pull up, it's better the time. So and Q
Speaker 1: and I we we talk a lot about Christian because
Speaker 1: he is kind of following in his dad's footsteps, with
Speaker 1: the with the with the hair, with the big wig
Speaker 1: afro thunder. It's mighty. He did it better than me.
Speaker 1: It's so big. But you know, he's the kindest human being.
Speaker 1: That's my baby. I love him. So, you know, there
Speaker 1: are some some things that are in place. You're absolutely right. Cue. Granted,
Speaker 1: I have to believe that on this level, on the
Speaker 1: on the individual level, you know, I've I've met the people.
Speaker 1: I've talked to them, I shook their hands, been on
Speaker 1: the show, They've been in the streets, I've seen them
Speaker 1: on television. I know that these people exist. They're not
Speaker 1: in the high up positions per se, but I know
Speaker 1: that there's more of us on this level than there
Speaker 1: are them up there. That's a very small minority, right.
Speaker 1: So so my my hope, I believe, comes from those
Speaker 1: interactions when I'm looking into a pair of blue eyes
Speaker 1: and some blonde hair or some you know, some Irish
Speaker 1: kid or whatever, you know, and they're like, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: I don't I don't even need to know. I just
Speaker 1: love you. I'm here to love. How do we how
Speaker 1: do we make this? What can you teach me? You know?
Speaker 1: Those people, those people give me the hope that I
Speaker 1: need to know. That, Okay, Because if it was just
Speaker 1: black people, we were just a minority, and we were
Speaker 1: slowly getting crushed out of existence by being murdered or
Speaker 1: picked off or you know whatever, that'd be one thing.
Speaker 1: But there's so many people. We saw them during the protests,
Speaker 1: you know that that happened in my lifetime. I have
Speaker 1: a memory I saw people with their heads wrapped up. Man,
Speaker 1: I could cry, they did not need to be there
Speaker 1: Asian people. They don't need to be out there at all.
Speaker 2: I got, I got some very important things to add
Speaker 2: to what you're saying.
Speaker 1: Not to cut you off, but just necessary to say.
Speaker 2: If not for allies that didn't look like us, it
Speaker 2: wouldn't have been no.
Speaker 1: Civil rights movie yet. Absolutely so, that's not new.
Speaker 2: And they knew that we'd outnumber them. That's why things
Speaker 2: like the three fifth and the Electoral College, that's why
Speaker 2: they exist, came in to exist, That's why they exist.
Speaker 2: They knew back then that they will be out They
Speaker 2: were already out numbered. But we don't want to get
Speaker 2: rid of this thing we have. So how about this?
Speaker 2: These people that we have that ain't nothing, they are something.
Speaker 1: Three fists of it, three fists of a thing, you
Speaker 1: see what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Even then, right, they put out the fire of a
Speaker 2: house that we were in, but it was their house.
Speaker 2: They wasn't trying to keep us from burning up. They
Speaker 2: were trying to keep their house from burning up. We
Speaker 2: just so happened to benefit from it slightly, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. Yeah, So, and Mitch McConnell was the
Speaker 2: modern day version of that.
Speaker 1: You know I'm not.
Speaker 2: This isn't pseudoscience. I'm not reaching to the edges of
Speaker 2: these arguments. We It's really really sad that one of
Speaker 2: the main reasons why the progress.
Speaker 1: Is as slow as it.
Speaker 2: Is is that no one wants to say, man, that
Speaker 2: wasn't just them.
Speaker 1: That was me. Because during these last years, as we
Speaker 1: dealt with they knew proud boys environment.
Speaker 2: I had people that I care about, people that I
Speaker 2: call friends, people that I hug and smile when I'm around,
Speaker 2: message me, reach out to me in defense of what
Speaker 2: was going on in the streets to our people, not
Speaker 2: because they thought it was right.
Speaker 1: Rams. But when you see parts of you over there,
Speaker 1: you're not defending Donald Trump. You're defending you. I think
Speaker 1: that's wrong. But man, I think that way too, and
Speaker 1: I'm not a bad person, so he must not be
Speaker 1: a bad person. And that's not unique to Donald Trumps,
Speaker 1: you know exactly. So the reason why the progress is
Speaker 1: so slow is because that very very difficult reconciliation, accountability,
Speaker 1: and acceptance of very very harsh truths is almost certainly
Speaker 1: never going to happen. If you say the word reparation,
Speaker 1: people act like you're the one that's tripping that. So
Speaker 1: let me say this. So let me say this. You know,
Speaker 1: we've done a lot of talking. We didn't get to
Speaker 1: a lot of our notes, but I think it was
Speaker 1: a good conversation. This is the therapy that we sometimes
Speaker 1: are able to have on this show. But I do
Speaker 1: want to mention some of the notes that I didn't
Speaker 1: get to, and perhaps we'll do them in a later show.
Speaker 1: But I wanted to talk about the way systemic racism
Speaker 1: works and the way it has manifested itself in this society.
Speaker 1: And you know, I'll read.
Speaker 2: There's such a thing as systemic absolute I was told
Speaker 2: by some very well spoken black people very recently that
Speaker 2: there was no such thing.
Speaker 1: Of course, did they have a vested interest in saying that.
Speaker 2: Well, like I said before, no one they know has
Speaker 2: ever owned slaves. No one that they know has ever
Speaker 2: been a slave. Listen, man, that's okay, So forget that
Speaker 2: for a second, because I don't really I don't like
Speaker 2: dealing with people who are not intellectually Yeah, and you know,
Speaker 2: cognitive dissonance is.
Speaker 1: Never mind, all right, So I wanted to talk about
Speaker 1: how American finance, the American economic advantage in the world
Speaker 1: was founded during slavery on the back of slaves, African slaves,
Speaker 1: free labor. I wanted to discuss the economic consequences of
Speaker 1: segregation and how segregation works against the society. And these
Speaker 1: are things that have been fleshed out during the Civil
Speaker 1: Rights movement, during you know, different points in time in
Speaker 1: the history, but you know, we can bring them up.
Speaker 1: Predatory lending in black communities. African Americans with college degrees
Speaker 1: are twice as likely to be unemployed as other graduates.
Speaker 1: I wanted to talk about redlining again, which is something
Speaker 1: we've discussed on the show. Redlining, for those who don't know,
Speaker 1: is when banks and lenders would lend money for you know,
Speaker 1: the purchase of houses and these areas and not in
Speaker 1: these areas, and you couldn't qualify for loans to buy
Speaker 1: your land, or buy your house, or develop anything in
Speaker 1: these neighborhoods because you were considered higher risk without any
Speaker 1: high risk factors. It was a way that the government
Speaker 1: was able to keep government money in the hands of
Speaker 1: incentivized to do so what they thought was the the
Speaker 1: best version of America, i e. White folks. So black
Speaker 1: folks were not able to participate in that, which is
Speaker 1: why black households now on average half one tenth the
Speaker 1: wealth of the average white household. It goes directly back
Speaker 1: to redlining. I wanted to talk about how black graduates
Speaker 1: from top colleges face discrimination and job search and in
Speaker 1: salaries college students. Black college students have the same chances
Speaker 1: of getting a job as a white high school dropout.
Speaker 1: So me, I have a master's degree, so maybe that
Speaker 1: helps a bit, But if I had a bachelor's only,
Speaker 1: I'd have the same chances of getting a job as
Speaker 1: a white high school dropout. And even with that master's degree,
Speaker 1: you need to know someone at the company you're applying to. Sure, sure, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: You spoke of reparations. So the country floated this idea
Speaker 1: of forty acres and a mule would be given to
Speaker 1: eat slave upon their freedom, so that they would have
Speaker 1: some sense of or some capacity to determine their economic future.
Speaker 1: And that was never fulfilled. That was referred to as
Speaker 1: forty acres and a mule, and that would be at
Speaker 1: least six point four trillion dollars in today's money. So
Speaker 1: I wanted to discuss that, you know, you brought up reparations,
Speaker 1: and how folks you know and bear in mind that
Speaker 1: this country has paid reparations to Native folks, to Asian
Speaker 1: folks when they were in you know, during the Jewish Americans. Absolutely, absolutely,
Speaker 1: but black folks is just somehow America has decided to
Speaker 1: divorce herself from that issue and holds, deliberately holds all
Speaker 1: of the economic shortcomings over black people's heads. You got
Speaker 1: to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, Ramses. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: that's where we are, but we were out of time.
Speaker 1: I couldn't even finish the list. But thank you for
Speaker 1: tuning into civiy Cipher once again on Ramsay's job. They
Speaker 1: called me you ward, and we'll see you next week.
Speaker 1: Check out the website civiccipher dot com for more info
Speaker 1: into download past shows. All right, yes,