Speaker 1: Coming up on the AID building.
Speaker 2: I do not care if my protests made a difference.
Speaker 2: I do not care if Colin Kaepernick's protest makes a difference,
Speaker 2: because's not what you create for, that's not what you
Speaker 2: play for, and that's not what you protest for.
Speaker 3: I was watching a man suffocate to death slowly. It's
Speaker 3: traumatizing for anybody who watches it.
Speaker 1: Episode two, Justice for George Floyd.
Speaker 4: See him? Is this the room? No?
Speaker 1: I think it's at the end of the hall.
Speaker 4: Are we really gonna do this? Of course we are.
Speaker 4: Here was the moment, the moment when a group of
Speaker 4: concerned students made their final towards the boarder Trustees building.
Speaker 4: Tensions are high, the reality of what they're about to
Speaker 4: do is starting to kick in.
Speaker 1: The gear for the heights was simple, some water, some food.
Speaker 1: They purchased some padlocks from a local Atlanta hardware store.
Speaker 1: They plant to chain the door and lock themselves into
Speaker 1: the Board of Trustee meeting.
Speaker 4: Lock in protests have become a popular tool of activism.
Speaker 4: In the sixties, anti war movements spread around the country,
Speaker 4: and students would attach themselves to police cars, works of art,
Speaker 4: and even storm in the boardrooms to draw attention to
Speaker 4: their cause.
Speaker 1: Beautifully manicured lawns sprawled over the Moorhouse campus. The administration
Speaker 1: wanted the grass to be kept in perfect condition. They
Speaker 1: placed giant chains around the grass to keep the students
Speaker 1: off the lawn. Those very chains were used to lock
Speaker 1: in the board of trustees. Okay, okay, okay, everyone relaxed.
Speaker 1: We don't have guns. We're just here to talk. This
Speaker 1: event was more than a simple protest. This was a
Speaker 1: call for action. The future of Morehouse and perhaps all
Speaker 1: historically black colleges and universities, were at stake. These students
Speaker 1: were willing to put their entire academic future at risk
Speaker 1: for the chance to make change.
Speaker 4: They wanted Morehouse to be part of a larger conversation.
Speaker 4: Martin Luther King Junior was just murdered that his father
Speaker 4: in Monkey Senior would be present as a member of
Speaker 4: the board. Truly, you understand what they were fighting for.
Speaker 1: Ironically, the education at Morehouse encouraged students to take exactly
Speaker 1: this kind of bold action. To be a morehouseman was
Speaker 1: to be active and engaged. Right from the mission statement
Speaker 1: and I quote Morehouse College mission is to develop men
Speaker 1: who lead lives of service and leadership.
Speaker 4: They want to develop men with discipline minds. They want
Speaker 4: to teach the history and culture of black people. They
Speaker 4: want to promote a sense of belonging for all. They
Speaker 4: prepare students for a rapidly changing world.
Speaker 1: In the late sixties, it felt like the world was
Speaker 1: changing by the minute, and the men of Morehouse refused
Speaker 1: to be left behind. This takeover would be the first
Speaker 1: step in that process, a process for reform and change.
Speaker 1: At the epicenter of black intellectual thought.
Speaker 4: This was more than a protest. It was a heist,
Speaker 4: a heist of ideas, and a heist for the future.
Speaker 4: But what is a protest? May twenty twenty, a world
Speaker 4: already made a one ten a century pandemic would again
Speaker 4: change forever. In Minneapolis, Minnesota, a forty six year old
Speaker 4: black man named George Floyd is murdered by Derek Charlott,
Speaker 4: an officer when an extensive record of razor complaints and brutality.
Speaker 3: Please please are gave release please man, please.
Speaker 4: On this day. The death of this man would create
Speaker 4: a worldwide movement against police brutality.
Speaker 1: Unlike the nineteen ninety two Rodney King riots in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: these riots would spread much like the invisible monster that
Speaker 1: was keeping us all in our homes. But this monster
Speaker 1: was protests. This monster was resistance. Any social distancing from
Speaker 1: this issue was impossible, and it brought people back out
Speaker 1: to the streets.
Speaker 4: What is a protest? What does it actually need to resist?
Speaker 1: Resistance in the Black experience go hand in hand. The
Speaker 1: uncomfortable connection to Black pain and the American experiment make
Speaker 1: some holidays and memorials awkward.
Speaker 4: In the summer of toy twenty many of those memorials
Speaker 4: were burned to the ground. And of course, in times
Speaker 4: of turmoil, we live to our leadership to provide calm
Speaker 4: in the face of chaos.
Speaker 5: Our nation has been gripped by professional anarchists, violent mobs, arsonists, saluters, criminals, writers, Antifa,
Speaker 5: and others. A number of state and local governments have
Speaker 5: failed to take necessary action to safeguard their residents. Innocent
Speaker 5: people have been savagely beaten, like the young man in Dallas,
Speaker 5: Texas who was left dying on the street, or the
Speaker 5: woman in upstate New York viciously attacked by dangerous thugs.
Speaker 5: Small business owners have seen their dreams utterly destroyed. New
Speaker 5: York's finests have been hit in the face with bricks.
Speaker 5: Brave nurses who have battled the virus are afraid to
Speaker 5: leave their homes. A police precinct has been over run
Speaker 5: here in the nation's capital. The Lincoln Memorial and the
Speaker 5: World War II Memorial have been vandalized. One of our
Speaker 5: most historic churches was set ablaze. A federal officer in California,
Speaker 5: an African American enforcement here was shot and killed. These
Speaker 5: are not acts of peaceful protests. These are acts of
Speaker 5: domestic terror. The destruction of innocent life and the spilling
Speaker 5: of innocent blood is an offense to humanity and a
Speaker 5: crime against God. American needs creation, not destruction, Justice not chaos.
Speaker 5: This is our mission and we will succeed one hundred percent.
Speaker 5: We will succeed. Our country always wins.
Speaker 4: Well. I didn't help. For more detail in this event,
Speaker 4: I spoke with film Mark schum whose award winning film
Speaker 4: Police on Trial covered the murder of George Floyd in
Speaker 4: Chauvin's trial. He was one of the first reporters on
Speaker 4: the ground when the riots began in Minnesota. So, Mike,
Speaker 4: where were you when George Floyd was killed?
Speaker 3: I was living in the Twin Cities in Minnesota when
Speaker 3: George Floyd was killed. In fact, where I was living
Speaker 3: was maybe less than eight miles from where he was killed.
Speaker 4: Well, I didn't even realize you were that close to
Speaker 4: actually where it happened. Yeah, So draw the timeline of
Speaker 4: his murder versus like the date of the murderer versus
Speaker 4: when the the actual footage came out, Like what was that?
Speaker 4: What was the initial reaction just right there at ground
Speaker 4: zero in Minnesota to all that.
Speaker 3: You know, to your point, I think even myself I
Speaker 3: was surprised at how close I was to where he
Speaker 3: was killed, because so much of how any of us
Speaker 3: were interacting with the world was through social media, so
Speaker 3: everything's spelt so close but also so.
Speaker 1: Very far away.
Speaker 3: And so when I was seeing video footage primarily across Facebook,
Speaker 3: actually being shared about George Floyd's killing, I didn't watch
Speaker 3: the video at first too quickly. I actually think my
Speaker 3: wife watched it first, and as she was watching it,
Speaker 3: I could just see her mortified, And so for myself,
Speaker 3: shortly after that I sat and watched it. I have
Speaker 3: to sort of when I'm about to watch disturbing material,
Speaker 3: I sort of have to rewire my brain for a second.
Speaker 3: So my initial watch of Darnella Frasier's video was shocked.
Speaker 4: No doubt.
Speaker 3: But then I sort of paused and sort of rewired
Speaker 3: my brain and focused a bit to see what am
Speaker 3: I looking at here? And I watch the entire video
Speaker 3: and it was, you know, nothing short of horrific. I
Speaker 3: was watching a man suffgate to death slowly. It's traumatizing
Speaker 3: for anybody who watches it.
Speaker 4: The violence was so visceral, and it was also so organized.
Speaker 4: Show then his reaction and nonchalant attitude as he was
Speaker 4: you know, pressed against his neck, and there was the
Speaker 4: other cops organizing the crowd. Nothing to see here. It
Speaker 4: was the other human beings around saying, hey, it seems
Speaker 4: like you're killing that guy, you know, like it seems
Speaker 4: like the ignoring of that. It was such an interesting
Speaker 4: manifestation of all the elements of the human condition, right,
Speaker 4: kind of all happening in one moment. You kind of
Speaker 4: saw the extremity of the state. You actually saw good
Speaker 4: Samaritans like, hey, that doesn't seem right. There was an
Speaker 4: actual first responder there saying, yeah, you're actually putting that
Speaker 4: you're actually killing that guy for you know, for a
Speaker 4: non violent offense. All these things were happening at once,
Speaker 4: and I think at a time where emotions were high anyway,
Speaker 4: where we literally were facing kind of this invisible monster
Speaker 4: that had all kind of forced us into the house
Speaker 4: and had forced us to, i don't know, re evaluate
Speaker 4: our own social contracts in a lot of ways. That
Speaker 4: that was a really visceral thing to see at that
Speaker 4: particular moment.
Speaker 3: I think there are a couple of things you said
Speaker 3: that was striking. The first thing is my god, I mean,
Speaker 3: if you think about it, we had only been sheltered
Speaker 3: in place for less than three months. It felt like years,
Speaker 3: but it was only less than three months. Lockdown started
Speaker 3: happening pretty uniformly, like March twelfth, March thirteen, something around then,
Speaker 3: and this happened May twenty five. God you all right,
Speaker 3: But being relegated to the indoor and and sort of
Speaker 3: shelter in place was in its own way, its own trauma, right.
Speaker 3: And then everything we're watching is heightened everything you said
Speaker 3: about this sort of confluence of moments, people highlighting that
Speaker 3: these police officers were killing George Floyd. And more than that,
Speaker 3: this felt like protocol. There's a sort of this is
Speaker 3: how we do things. Don't interrupt what we do, and
Speaker 3: yet bystanders felt the wherewithal to interrupt something that was
Speaker 3: clearly inhumane and clearly dehumanizing.
Speaker 6: Almost two months since the eyewitness video sparked a global movement, today,
Speaker 6: for the first time, previously unreleased police body camera footage
Speaker 6: showed that George Floyd told officers at least twenty eight
Speaker 6: times that couldn't breathe.
Speaker 4: It's one of those things you can't take out of context.
Speaker 4: Right when you just sit there and look at it,
Speaker 4: it's undeniable. Right then you see kind of the firestorm
Speaker 4: that it led to all over the world. So, speaking
Speaker 4: to your point, going back to what you talked about,
Speaker 4: in all of the different stories you've covered around the world,
Speaker 4: you've seen protesters put their lives in danger for their
Speaker 4: beliefs right there that they're taking it beyond just the hey,
Speaker 4: this is a geopolitical argument, or this is a this
Speaker 4: is a matter of civics. You've seen people say, Hey,
Speaker 4: I'm actually prepared to die for this belief. What have
Speaker 4: you seen that brings a person to that?
Speaker 3: To that point, honestly, there's I don't know that I
Speaker 3: have a very clear, straightforward answer to this, because this
Speaker 3: is something that I've been wrestling with for the better
Speaker 3: half of my life. I think a cause is broad
Speaker 3: enough to cover a lot of area. That is anger
Speaker 3: over an event, anger and frustration over an event like
Speaker 3: George Floyd's murder, and wanting accountability. The accountability is especially
Speaker 3: in that situation is deserved, was deserved. But what does
Speaker 3: that look like is another question. I think about the
Speaker 3: Arab Spring and Egypt and Jussie Babarik and Atarier Square,
Speaker 3: where people just had enough and wanted to feel that
Speaker 3: there was agency. And I think that's the case, or
Speaker 3: at least a pattern across most social movements is this
Speaker 3: desire for agency and feeling disempowered. But then mobilizing and
Speaker 3: protesting is a form of power. It's the power in
Speaker 3: everyone's feet to be able to come together and speak
Speaker 3: out to and against power in that sense, and that's
Speaker 3: I would say, that's a general idea of how I
Speaker 3: see people protesting and coming together.
Speaker 1: Some resistance is planned like a heist, with elaborate steps
Speaker 1: and concise moments for peak attention. Keen understood this in
Speaker 1: Birmingham and Selma. He knew the images of unarmed black
Speaker 1: youth attack by a violent arm of the state with
Speaker 1: elicit rage.
Speaker 7: Hey, I want to tell the city yourself, tell them
Speaker 7: doctor that we are not about to turn around. Yes, sir,
Speaker 7: we on the move now, Yes sir, Yes, were on
Speaker 7: the move and no way, but racism can stop us.
Speaker 7: Speak to my feet. Our God is marching on glory. Hallelujah, Colora, hallelujahujah.
Speaker 4: Some resistance come from the direct defiance to the state.
Speaker 1: Huey p.
Speaker 4: Noton understood the power of seeing black men in leather
Speaker 4: coats holding legally purchased weapons. The image itself was the
Speaker 4: act of resistance. In twenty twenty, all of these elements
Speaker 4: came to a shocking collision. But the roots take us
Speaker 4: back to our story. The roots take us back to
Speaker 4: the A Building. Welcome back to the A Building. The
Speaker 4: demands for the locking would be simple and straightforward. Number
Speaker 4: One a black studies program. By the late nineteen sixties,
Speaker 4: black studies programs were sprouting nationwide, but not at Morehouse.
Speaker 1: Number two community involvement in the housing projects around Morehouse College.
Speaker 1: Morehouse students felt isolated from the growing metro Atlanta. They
Speaker 1: want to be seen as members of the Atlanta community.
Speaker 4: Number three more people of color on the board of trustees.
Speaker 4: Morehouse College, the epicenter of black intellectual thought, was controlled
Speaker 4: by a predominantly board of trustees.
Speaker 1: This had to change. Number four. The boldest request the
Speaker 1: creation of Martin Luther King University, the consolidation of the
Speaker 1: six black schools in the area to become one large
Speaker 1: university with a focus on black studies.
Speaker 4: The take was clear, but the consequences of such an
Speaker 4: extreme measure could be devastating. One man learned the consequences
Speaker 4: of a simple act of protest. On September one, twenty sixteen,
Speaker 4: Colin Kaepernick took in me doing the national anthem of
Speaker 4: a preseason NFL game.
Speaker 8: I mean, ultimately is to bring awareness and make people
Speaker 8: realize what's really going on in this country. There are
Speaker 8: a lot of things that are going on that are unjust.
Speaker 8: People aren't being held accountable for and that's something that
Speaker 8: needs to change. No, this country stands for freedom, liberty,
Speaker 8: just this for all, and it's not happening for all
Speaker 8: right now.
Speaker 4: This act would set off a firestorm of controversy from
Speaker 4: the conservative media and even the President of the United States.
Speaker 4: Well you can imagine what Trump had to say about this.
Speaker 5: Would you love to see one of these NFL owners
Speaker 5: when somebody disrespects our flag to say, get that son
Speaker 5: of a bitch off the field.
Speaker 1: Right now out.
Speaker 7: He's fired. He's fired.
Speaker 1: Colin Kaepernick was by no means the first athlete to
Speaker 1: use his position to promote an important issue.
Speaker 4: In December twenty fourteen, Cleveland bounds wide receiver Andrew Hawkins
Speaker 4: war shirt onto the field before the game against the Bengals.
Speaker 4: Hawk was called attention to two black o'hai ends guilt
Speaker 4: during an encounter with law enforcement. The T shirt read
Speaker 4: simply Justice for Timyir Rice and John Crawford. The move
Speaker 4: drew startain criticism from some, with local police labeled his
Speaker 4: protests as pathetic and demanding an apology.
Speaker 1: Here's part of Hawk's elegant and touching response in conversation
Speaker 1: with the media the following day. I have a two
Speaker 1: year old little boy, and.
Speaker 2: That little boy is my entire world, and the number
Speaker 2: one reason for me wearing the T shirt was the
Speaker 2: thought of what happened to Tamir Rice. Happened into my
Speaker 2: little Austin scares the living hell out of me, and
Speaker 2: my heart was broken for the parents of Tamir and
Speaker 2: John Crawford.
Speaker 1: Knowing they had to.
Speaker 2: Live that nightmare of a reality. So, like I said,
Speaker 2: I made the conscious decision to wear the T shirt.
Speaker 2: I felt like my heart was in the right place.
Speaker 2: I'm at peace with it. And those who disagree with me,
Speaker 2: it's this is America.
Speaker 4: That's the point.
Speaker 2: Everyone has his right to their first First Amendment rights.
Speaker 2: Those who support me, I appreciate your support, but at
Speaker 2: the same time, support the causes and the people and
Speaker 2: the injustices that you feel strongly about.
Speaker 1: Stand up for him, Speak up for him no.
Speaker 2: Matter what it is, because that's what America is about,
Speaker 2: and that's what this country.
Speaker 1: Was founded on. We spoke with former NFL player turned
Speaker 1: pundit and media entrepreneur Andrew Hawkins about his protest and
Speaker 1: what came after. Andrew's really a pleasure to meet you.
Speaker 1: It's a pleasure to meet you guys as well. Appreciate
Speaker 1: you having me. Melick used to have a dream of
Speaker 1: being in the NFL.
Speaker 4: Hawk I was a lowly Division III football player.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's as close as he's ever gotten.
Speaker 4: So I mean, guess even the contextually, because I mean
Speaker 4: I remember this story of a big NFL fan, and
Speaker 4: I remember the backlash, but hearing your personal connection to
Speaker 4: the community and really all the things you were putting
Speaker 4: at stake. Do you remember the immediate reaction?
Speaker 1: So I put my shirt on.
Speaker 2: Just so happened that they were going to announce the
Speaker 2: offensive players this game, because it typically alternates offensive defense
Speaker 2: the starters, and so I was a starter, one of
Speaker 2: the last people to get announced. I come out with
Speaker 2: a T shirt on. All the pictures happened. We played
Speaker 2: a game, we get our ass kicked Johnny Manziel's first
Speaker 2: game starting. So it was like, I do you remember
Speaker 2: Johnny manziel experience. It was like media everywhere. I mean
Speaker 2: it was every media there anyway, everything was there already
Speaker 2: and I hadn't even thought about that, but that's like
Speaker 2: what made it blow up. And so during the game,
Speaker 2: I guess it started to It started to take on
Speaker 2: its own life, regardless of even what's happening in the game.
Speaker 1: And so afterwards it so.
Speaker 2: I get dressed, I take a T shirt off after
Speaker 2: I wear it, throw it to the side, if somebody
Speaker 2: grabs it, puts it on my locker.
Speaker 1: I get dressed. Afterwards, I'm headed home.
Speaker 2: And the lead PR person for the Browns calls and
Speaker 2: He's like, hey man, we got a little situation, and
Speaker 2: so they were a little blindsided by it. There is
Speaker 2: a part of me that does feel, even to this day,
Speaker 2: bad about that, because you want to get even no
Speaker 2: matter where they sit, you want to give them the
Speaker 2: option to be prepared for what is happening next. And
Speaker 2: so things started blowing up really quickly. My mom was
Speaker 2: in town that night, and the calls keep coming in.
Speaker 2: My phone's blowing up. I mean, I'm being called every
Speaker 2: name you can imagine on Twitter, on social media, you know,
Speaker 2: which I expected. I'm not reading it. I'm kind of
Speaker 2: letting it go, you know. So one call comes, the
Speaker 2: next call comes.
Speaker 1: I'm getting blown up by everybody in the media.
Speaker 2: The PR guy calls me back and was like, hey man,
Speaker 2: this is like, uh, we got it.
Speaker 1: We got to do something. The police are.
Speaker 2: Demanding an apology, they're threatening not to check the stadium,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, look, I'm not apologizing. I'm like I can,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go. I'll come in tomorrow, I'll say my
Speaker 2: piece and go from there. And so I didn't sleep
Speaker 2: that night. I stayed up, you know, me and my
Speaker 2: mom just talking and I kind of just started to
Speaker 2: gather my own thoughts, you know, and I wanted to
Speaker 2: be very clear, and I wanted to as much as
Speaker 2: I could explain what my thought process was to a point,
Speaker 2: but also just be very clear about why I'm completely
Speaker 2: okay with everything that happens after this.
Speaker 4: Welcome back to the A Building.
Speaker 1: Here's former NFL player Andrew Hawkins about his protest and
Speaker 1: what came after. As it blows up, blows up.
Speaker 2: It's in USA today, It's on CNN, it's on Fox News,
Speaker 2: It's on you.
Speaker 1: Know, Anderson Cooper, John Dally, I mean, you name, it
Speaker 1: is everywhere.
Speaker 2: And so I come in the next day and I
Speaker 2: tell them I'm not answering any questions.
Speaker 1: Get your cameras rolling. I'm just gonna save my piece
Speaker 1: and go from there.
Speaker 2: And so I went on about five to ten minute,
Speaker 2: you know, talk, just trying to speak from the heart,
Speaker 2: trying to hit the points that I felt like were
Speaker 2: important to hit. I said thank you, and I walked out.
Speaker 2: And I think from there it took on an even
Speaker 2: like in some ways, like fire to it, and it
Speaker 2: even went even bigger than because now you had people
Speaker 2: from every side having a very strong opinion about whatever
Speaker 2: they had an opinion about So did you.
Speaker 1: Ever get a sense as to why the police were offended?
Speaker 2: I mean, I probably have my opinions. I don't know
Speaker 2: if I got a sense in the moment. Now, I
Speaker 2: am not, especially at this time, would not consider myself
Speaker 2: political whatsoever. Very rarely, if ever, spoke on issues that
Speaker 2: didn't pertain to Am I catching the first down to
Speaker 2: get this contract?
Speaker 1: To provide for my family or not.
Speaker 2: Not to say that I'm not passionate about these things,
Speaker 2: but I think in that moment, for me, it was
Speaker 2: so very clear, like, yo, I don't give a fuck
Speaker 2: about football right now, right, And that's just the fact
Speaker 2: and that like and I'm okay because again, like I
Speaker 2: tell you, my passion for football was not driven by
Speaker 2: money or me being able to sit in a certain spot.
Speaker 2: My passion for football was driven by exactly that, my
Speaker 2: passion for football.
Speaker 4: And do you find that the audacity of that in
Speaker 4: itself offends people? You know what I mean, just the
Speaker 4: fact that this is what I think, because I feel
Speaker 4: like I think that there's an expectation and you see
Speaker 4: this in political discourse when it comes to athletes, where
Speaker 4: it's just hey, black guy, just be grateful. These people
Speaker 4: have given you all this.
Speaker 1: Money money, yeah, to play football. You really shouldn't have
Speaker 1: things to say yeah, or you shouldn't have passion.
Speaker 4: You should have passion for it exactly.
Speaker 2: I think that is absolutely what the overwhelming feedback was
Speaker 2: to me in that moment, regardless of like, hey, and
Speaker 2: even I would say that in some ways, man as
Speaker 2: fucked up as it is. Even the people were that
Speaker 2: were in support, there was a tone of like, oh,
Speaker 2: you put a sentence together pretty well for a football
Speaker 2: pl you know what I'm saying, And I would don't
Speaker 2: like exactly, and so you know which again, and I
Speaker 2: even say and they're like, yo, if you support me, awesome,
Speaker 2: appreciate it. Go do like your version of what this is.
Speaker 2: If you don't cool, you have your prerogative. It's a
Speaker 2: free country. I'm telling you what the hell I care
Speaker 2: about and what is most important to me in this moment.
Speaker 2: And if I make this decision now, I'm okay with
Speaker 2: everything that happens after it or whatever the consequences are.
Speaker 2: And as you would imagine, I mean, I got death threats.
Speaker 2: I had people tell me that they hey, there's you know,
Speaker 2: police are saying you better watch out, you know, your family,
Speaker 2: everything in between. And I would love to be like
Speaker 2: that was such a surprise to me, But unfortunately, these
Speaker 2: are all the things that I thought about going into
Speaker 2: me making the decision. So in some ways I was
Speaker 2: okay with it, but absolutely the overwhelming narrative was like,
Speaker 2: you don't get you don't get.
Speaker 1: To have an opinion.
Speaker 2: Like, not too long after that, I end up getting
Speaker 2: like maybe wrap put on my front all my rims
Speaker 2: at a place in Ohio and I got rapp put
Speaker 2: on it.
Speaker 1: I took my family to Tampa.
Speaker 2: I would train in the in Florida in the off seasons,
Speaker 2: and so I went down to Florida and had my
Speaker 2: car shipped. And what I would typically do is I
Speaker 2: would go a couple of days early, you know, get
Speaker 2: everything situated before I brought my family down to where
Speaker 2: I was and the car was shipped, and I pick
Speaker 2: up the car and I'm driving it back and to
Speaker 2: make a long story short, i start to hear like
Speaker 2: a squeaking of the wheels and I'm like, this is
Speaker 2: you know, it was damn near a brand new car
Speaker 2: at the time, like the first car that I even
Speaker 2: bought as a professional athlete. And I had been in
Speaker 2: the league seven years, and I'm like this, this some typically, right.
Speaker 2: So I go to pool over and both of my
Speaker 2: wheels fall off, right, So I'm still not thinking anything of.
Speaker 1: It, but my wheels fall off my car while.
Speaker 2: I'm driving on the highway and I pull over right
Speaker 2: before the literally come off the axle. And so I
Speaker 2: called somebody, Hey, you know something, You know, I got
Speaker 2: some dumble withere, a must not or whatever, and he
Speaker 2: goes to you know, picks it up, takes to the shop.
Speaker 2: I come back to pick it up, and he basically
Speaker 2: not knowing who I am or anything, he was just like, hey, man,
Speaker 2: to be honest, I've worked on cars for twenty years.
Speaker 1: I don't have no idea how this happens.
Speaker 2: And he was almost like, not almost, he was insinuating
Speaker 2: like you would have to just start working on cars
Speaker 2: for the very first time for your wheels to be
Speaker 2: all four of your wills to be loose, like like
Speaker 2: like it would have to be your first time doing this, right,
Speaker 2: almost like I don't know who you got beef with.
Speaker 4: I don't know who whatever, somebody was, somebody wanted to
Speaker 4: hurt you.
Speaker 2: It's he basically was alleging like, Yo, this doesn't feel like,
Speaker 2: you know, unless you just had a friend do it.
Speaker 1: Nobody who works on.
Speaker 2: Cars would make this mistake. Now, what you can believe in,
Speaker 2: what you can prove with two different things, And you know,
Speaker 2: I'm very much like, Okay, I'll let God take care
Speaker 2: of them type of thing I called, and you know,
Speaker 2: I got I got in the ass a little bit.
Speaker 2: But at the same time, like from a public standpoint,
Speaker 2: I came into this knowing what could happen. I can't
Speaker 2: state enough how okay I was worth everything after that,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So in retrospect, has anyone been like we were wrong?
Speaker 1: I don't know if anybody would say they were wrong.
Speaker 2: One of the coolest things for me was in that
Speaker 2: moment the ownership of the Cleveland Browns. They called me
Speaker 2: into their office at some point, you know, and it
Speaker 2: was again I came into this expecting they were going
Speaker 2: to cut me if I did whatever, and their response was, hey,
Speaker 2: I'm very proud of you, and I'm like kind of
Speaker 2: took me back a little bit.
Speaker 1: Like they're sitting there and they're like, you.
Speaker 2: Did what you believed in, you know, regardless of what
Speaker 2: anybody thinks or where we sit or whoever sits.
Speaker 1: A man follows his convictions. He stands on it, and
Speaker 1: he lives with it.
Speaker 2: And you know, we wish more, just players in general,
Speaker 2: had that kind of mentality to take care of their
Speaker 2: own business, we'd probably be better off.
Speaker 1: And I'm not gonna lie. That surprised the hell out
Speaker 1: of me.
Speaker 2: That was so at that time, especially opposite of what
Speaker 2: the narratives were, you know, for people that were probably
Speaker 2: in my situation.
Speaker 4: At any point, did you get any warnings or feedback
Speaker 4: that you might be in danger in the local community.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like I said, I mean, somebody you know pulled
Speaker 2: me aside and said, hey, I know so and so on.
Speaker 2: It's connected to this person. They're saying you better watch
Speaker 2: out man, like they're you know, And he wasn't saying
Speaker 2: it like threatening. He was saying it in like people
Speaker 2: are pissed type of thing. You know, you know, some
Speaker 2: singular person or some you know people want to do
Speaker 2: harm to you.
Speaker 1: I'd want you to be aware that this could be
Speaker 1: a possibility. So yeah, in the height of the storm,
Speaker 1: in the height of the national tension, you're getting What
Speaker 1: was it like among your brothers in the league and
Speaker 1: that your brothers in the shield.
Speaker 2: I feel like it was probably overwhelmingly supportive. A lot
Speaker 2: of the players were basically commended me because they understood
Speaker 2: or at that time what they thought was like, man,
Speaker 2: that is you took a risk, bro, Like you're risking
Speaker 2: all this money, You risking all this opportunity, You risking
Speaker 2: everything that you've worked for to take a chance to
Speaker 2: do something.
Speaker 1: That has nothing to do with you, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying.
Speaker 2: And I think a lot of them looked up to
Speaker 2: me in that way, and I've had I've had to
Speaker 2: this day people reach out in that way. I have
Speaker 2: an incredible relationship with Colin Kaepernett, and after that moment
Speaker 2: it was like kind of when we connected and he
Speaker 2: thanked me, you know, for speaking up, but also said like, oh,
Speaker 2: that took a lot of.
Speaker 1: Courage, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: And we've been friends ever since, you know, because we
Speaker 2: had that kind of that shared passion even if in
Speaker 2: a moment to to speak out.
Speaker 1: Do you think that your protest made a difference, I
Speaker 1: don't care.
Speaker 2: I do not care if my protest made a difference.
Speaker 2: I do not care if Colin Kaepernick's protest makes a difference.
Speaker 2: I don't care if anybody's protests makes it different, and
Speaker 2: they shouldn't either, because's not what you create for. That's
Speaker 2: not what you play for, and that's not what you
Speaker 2: protest for. You do it because you care about it,
Speaker 2: and it's put on your heart to speak out.
Speaker 1: And let the chips fall where you're made.
Speaker 2: Because maybe that in and of itself is the reason.
Speaker 2: Maybe Colin seen some version of that, and it might
Speaker 2: have been like, Oh, I don't like what he did here,
Speaker 2: so I'm gonna do it this way. I don't like
Speaker 2: what he said here, so I'm going to say it
Speaker 2: this way, you know, and someone will see him.
Speaker 1: I don't know what ten year old saw Colin.
Speaker 2: Kaepernick taking a knee, and when they turn thirty, are
Speaker 2: going to, you know, contribute to whatever pushes things forward.
Speaker 2: But that's why it's important for you to let your
Speaker 2: passion drive you. Somebody needs to be the spark to
Speaker 2: sparks Martin Luther King. Someone needs to be to spark
Speaker 2: the spark Andrew Hawkins. Someone needs to spark Colin Kaepernick.
Speaker 2: Somebody needs to spark Samuel Jackson, and who knows who
Speaker 2: Samuel Jackson in this story will spark you know, and
Speaker 2: I think like for me, I don't know if I
Speaker 2: made a difference, but I know from that point forward
Speaker 2: to maor Rights was national news.
Speaker 4: Thank you for all the time giving us.
Speaker 1: Appreciate you having me.
Speaker 4: The Souls of Black Folks by W. E. B. Du
Speaker 4: Bois is a master text of Black American folklore. Du
Speaker 4: Boys lays the tracks for one hundred years of black
Speaker 4: intellectual thought. He emphasizes his relationship the Black American should
Speaker 4: have with colleges universities. He writes, the function.
Speaker 9: Of the university is not simply to teach bread winning,
Speaker 9: or to furnish teachers for the public schools, or to
Speaker 9: be a center of polite society. It is, above all
Speaker 9: to be the organ of that fine adjustment between real
Speaker 9: life and the growing knowledge of life, an adjustment which
Speaker 9: forms the secret of civilization.
Speaker 1: In the intellectual beef between the Boys and Booker T. Washington,
Speaker 1: those lines were a lethal distrack Atlanta. This idea sits
Speaker 1: at the very core of being a more houseman. The
Speaker 1: bold act of a Locke in protest would be just
Speaker 1: what more housemen would do. It's what they were taught,
Speaker 1: just not against their own administration.
Speaker 4: Mass protest is still the most effective way to fight injustice. However,
Speaker 4: the state has weaponized our right to protest against us.
Speaker 4: It has become a capital crime.
Speaker 1: Chaos on the streets of Argentina, anti capitalist demonstrators rioted.
Speaker 3: There are pockets of our society that are not just broken,
Speaker 3: but frankly sick, which I poor, get poor.
Speaker 1: If you come, I want to do this thing, We'll
Speaker 1: do this.
Speaker 4: Everything has been demolished and everything as ashes now well
Speaker 4: we want it.
Speaker 6: To be as part of the solution.
Speaker 1: But the protesters anger cannot be contained. The protest augments
Speaker 1: the immune system of any republic.
Speaker 4: Next time on the A Building.
Speaker 9: So in nineteen sixty eight when my uncle was killed,
Speaker 9: you want to know about that time and then the
Speaker 9: subsequent protest.
Speaker 4: But Martin Luther King Jr. Who was not trying to
Speaker 4: divide anybody.
Speaker 1: The A Building is produced by Imagine Audio for iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 1: It is written and hosted by me, Hans Charles and
Speaker 1: my co host menelike La Mumba.
Speaker 4: It is executive produced by Carral Welker and Nathan Kloke.
Speaker 4: Me menelik Lamomba and Hans.
Speaker 1: Charles executive producers at iHeart podcasts are Katrina Norville and
Speaker 1: Niki Torre. Marketing lead is David Wasserman.
Speaker 4: It is produced, directed, and edited by Timothy Fernarra, with
Speaker 4: producer John Asanti, sound design and music by Alloy.
Speaker 1: Trex and special thanks to April Ryan, Doctor, Elia Davis,
Speaker 1: Kim vc Ada, Bobby know and James Early. If you
Speaker 1: enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate and review the
Speaker 1: A Building on Apple podcast or wherever you get your
Speaker 1: podcast