Speaker 1: Do I start. Welcome to the podcast. I'm happy to start.
Speaker 1: This is comedian W Kamal Bell. We met years ago
Speaker 1: at the beginning of both of our careers. I think
Speaker 1: I bombed a couple of volunteer events. Yeah, you bombed
Speaker 1: a little bit and I got to see bombs. I
Speaker 1: love this guy. Look at him bombing like a pro. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's great and uh and yeah, it's been wild that
Speaker 1: our careers have gone in these crazy trajectories and now
Speaker 1: we reunited to discuss Fred Rogers today come Out has
Speaker 1: a CNN show called United Shades of America where he
Speaker 1: travels around the US talking to people about what's wrong
Speaker 1: with this country. And I wanted to talk with him
Speaker 1: because he did something really interesting with that show. He
Speaker 1: sat down with some of the most hateful people I
Speaker 1: can think of, and he had a conversation. I'm Carvel
Speaker 1: Wallace and this is Finding Fred, a podcast about Fred
Speaker 1: Rogers from I Heeart Media and Fatherly in partnership with
Speaker 1: Transmitter Media Early and I think it was the first season.
Speaker 1: You talked with some white nationalists, uh, and some pretty
Speaker 1: heavy movers in that. I imagine you've got a lot
Speaker 1: of pushback from people about giving the people platform given,
Speaker 1: how did you make sense? Why did you decide to
Speaker 1: do that, and what did you learn in that experience.
Speaker 1: I believe, and you know, platforming Richard Spencer or any
Speaker 1: of these people would be tonight in the United Shades,
Speaker 1: I'm going to take the night off and let Richard
Speaker 1: Spencer run the show. To me, that's platforming. That's normalizing.
Speaker 1: Sitting out and talking to Richard Spencer about what he
Speaker 1: believes in all of his white nationalists beliefs in the
Speaker 1: middle of an episode that is highlighting the importance of
Speaker 1: immigration and refugees in this country. To me, it's not platforming.
Speaker 1: I also think when Trump was first selected, the fear
Speaker 1: of platforming and normalizing is I think we're really buzzwords
Speaker 1: at the left held onto in lieu of doing the
Speaker 1: actual work, Like you know, no, we I feel like
Speaker 1: looking at it in the face is actually helpful to
Speaker 1: me to go how serious is this? Not looking at
Speaker 1: it in the face? To me, is is sort of
Speaker 1: a way to sort of like just pretend like you
Speaker 1: can still go to yoga class and and uh in
Speaker 1: the farmer's market. Because I think the reason why we
Speaker 1: have Trumpet office right now is because a lot of
Speaker 1: people on the left were wanting to look at him,
Speaker 1: you know, they weren't willing to really like is this possible. No,
Speaker 1: it's not possible because I've been doing a chance in
Speaker 1: the morning. So for me, it's the fact is it's
Speaker 1: like if we've if we if we've learned anything in
Speaker 1: this current air of America that we got to look
Speaker 1: at the stuff in the face, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So for me, you know, it's the it's sunlight's the
Speaker 1: best disinfectant. Like I believe that. Did you find Richard Spencer,
Speaker 1: uh intimidating who's probably a foot shorter than you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's not as short as most whites spread. I think
Speaker 1: that's why he was the leader. He was like, uh,
Speaker 1: did you play in the NBA. After you go in there,
Speaker 1: you do realize everybody's like five four and like, and
Speaker 1: they would sort of trying to like walk up to me,
Speaker 1: a couple of them trying to get me to a
Speaker 1: flinch or just sort of like and it was like,
Speaker 1: also six four, man, I'm not, I'm not. I just
Speaker 1: sort of like it became fun to me to sort
Speaker 1: of like look comfortable, you know. And so by the
Speaker 1: time I sat down and talked to him. It was
Speaker 1: really fine. We are here to talk about Mr Rogers,
Speaker 1: And that's good because I was like, man, this is
Speaker 1: really not what I prepared. Know. I tend to approach
Speaker 1: things from like a um And Uh, the reason I'm
Speaker 1: asking about your experiences with Richard Spencer's because I've been
Speaker 1: really stuck on this this sort of ethical position that
Speaker 1: Fred Rogers took, which is that it's it's you I like,
Speaker 1: I like you just the way you are, Uh, that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. And I wonder how that squares with
Speaker 1: people who were like Richard Spencer. Could Fred Rogers say
Speaker 1: I like you just the way you are? And I
Speaker 1: know you can't speak for him, So I'm going to
Speaker 1: ask you to speak for you. Did you when you
Speaker 1: look at him, see anything that you felt compared fashion
Speaker 1: forward when you talked with Richard Spencer or some of
Speaker 1: these other white nationalists. So, Uh, the thing is when
Speaker 1: I think about that, I like you just where you are.
Speaker 1: When you sit down with people individually, a lot of
Speaker 1: times all that stuff, a lot of the bluster goes away.
Speaker 1: Like when I talked to the clan and uh, in
Speaker 1: was it in Kentucky? It became very clear to me
Speaker 1: after a while, like, Oh, you guys have come from
Speaker 1: a community where there's no jobs, there's no opportunity, your
Speaker 1: educational system isn't good, and you're just mad, and you
Speaker 1: have bought a bill of goods from somebody that is
Speaker 1: black people's fault. Like that's the problem is that that
Speaker 1: you went from, Like I want more opportunity and more
Speaker 1: jobs of my community too, it's got to be somebody's fault.
Speaker 1: And then somebody sold you can we talk to you
Speaker 1: about black people? They handed you the it's black people
Speaker 1: of fault plans. And so for me, when I take
Speaker 1: away the when I look at that part, I go,
Speaker 1: that's the part I could have empathy with. You know,
Speaker 1: these people are not the billionaire people who are sort
Speaker 1: of running this country and using tools of white supremacy
Speaker 1: to keep things going. These are people who are got
Speaker 1: sold a bill of goods based on being vulnerable. A
Speaker 1: few years ago, I was in Michigan reporting a story.
Speaker 1: I was at the gym and I looked up and
Speaker 1: saw Kamal's face on the TV screen. This was several
Speaker 1: months after the election, and the alt right was feeling
Speaker 1: definitely emboldened, so much so in fact, that they were
Speaker 1: white supremacists marching in downtown Berkeley, of all places, which
Speaker 1: happened to be where Kamal lived. He had just spoken
Speaker 1: at a counter protest and on Fox News they were
Speaker 1: playing his speech and calling him a radical black separatist,
Speaker 1: and suddenly Kamal had become a target of white supremacists.
Speaker 1: That was when I got streets got hot for me
Speaker 1: for a second, exactly the streets got hot for you,
Speaker 1: And all of a sudden, I was I had a
Speaker 1: lot of feelings seen that, actually, dude, Like on the
Speaker 1: one hand, I was like, this is absurd, but then
Speaker 1: in the other hand, it kind of struck a little
Speaker 1: bit of fear my heart because I thought, God, if
Speaker 1: you can call comal, or if you can get like
Speaker 1: like the Confederate flag waivers income ou as a black separty,
Speaker 1: what who among us is safe? Like this is the
Speaker 1: most integrated dude I've ever met. And uh and um.
Speaker 1: I was just really amazed by that, and I thought
Speaker 1: a lot about it, and I guess I want to
Speaker 1: ask you what that experience was like for you to
Speaker 1: be targeted in that way, and how you made sense
Speaker 1: of that, like how you navigated that was that scary
Speaker 1: at all, Like it only became because you had kids
Speaker 1: at that point. Yeah, it became scary because over the
Speaker 1: next week or so, its like I became the like
Speaker 1: the the deep intern dark web, intern hinterland Internet all
Speaker 1: right target, Like I was just the person on the
Speaker 1: summer Jam screen. So like like so all these memes
Speaker 1: start going up, and you know, we were in downtown Berkeley,
Speaker 1: so people see me walking into my house, you know,
Speaker 1: and also we're right down where all the alt right
Speaker 1: rallies are. It was scary. It was like the first
Speaker 1: time I felt like that my thing deal on TV
Speaker 1: is can affect my family, like in a way that
Speaker 1: it feels like we have to sort of like think
Speaker 1: about our security protocols and think about like where we
Speaker 1: send our kids to school as opposed to like oh yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, and all these sorts of things that sort
Speaker 1: of that that we weren't thinking in that way before.
Speaker 1: Doesn't that kind of make you hate people like they're
Speaker 1: putting your family in jeopardy and putting you in the
Speaker 1: situation where you feel like, I mean, doesn't that like
Speaker 1: trigger rage and hating you know, it triggers, like I'd say,
Speaker 1: it triggers like Papa Bear, protect your family. You know.
Speaker 1: It triggers like don't do anything stupid. The people who
Speaker 1: are doing this I already wasn't a fan of anyway
Speaker 1: like this has. Yeah, I sort of knew this, you know.
Speaker 1: And also the history of black people in this country
Speaker 1: is that, you know, you can't know the history of
Speaker 1: our people without knowing that, like, you know, we get
Speaker 1: taken out regularly. Now. I don't think I'm not trying
Speaker 1: to be some sort of martyr or something, but it's
Speaker 1: just like, if I choose to do this work and
Speaker 1: I choose to be public about it, It's not that
Speaker 1: I'm like ready to die or any of that nonsense.
Speaker 1: You know, I got too children to die right now.
Speaker 1: But I do feel like this is a part of
Speaker 1: the gig. I mean, my wife talked about that, like,
Speaker 1: and I think about like people like Dick Gregory as
Speaker 1: far as like he actually gave up comedy to be
Speaker 1: an activist at one point in his life. And so
Speaker 1: this is the work I want to do, and it
Speaker 1: feels right now in this country, feels like it's necessary.
Speaker 1: If anything, I feel bad, but I'm not doing more
Speaker 1: of it. I think more about that, like what more
Speaker 1: can I do or how can I do this better
Speaker 1: than I think about the people who who have enmity
Speaker 1: towards me. And also the thing is most of them
Speaker 1: don't even They're just blah blah blah, like they're gonna
Speaker 1: move on to the next person. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1: What's your first earliest memory of seeing Fred Rogers or
Speaker 1: seeing a show? Did you watch it growing up? I
Speaker 1: watched you growing up, so I don't have like, h
Speaker 1: I don't have the time. My mom sat me down.
Speaker 1: We didn't have cable, so maybe cable. Uh, And so
Speaker 1: you know, I'm talking about like Sesame Street, Mr Rogers,
Speaker 1: the Electric Company, three to one contact for my old
Speaker 1: heads out there lane right now. Yeah, So for me,
Speaker 1: like Mr. Rogers is just one of the things that
Speaker 1: I watched on TV. And then for me, the weird
Speaker 1: part is like even when I got older, every now
Speaker 1: again you flip past and go, let me just watch
Speaker 1: a few minutes. Why what is what? What did that
Speaker 1: bring to you? I think there's something the greatest of
Speaker 1: kids programming, there's something so pure about it that it's
Speaker 1: doing anything wants to do that adults watch it too, Like,
Speaker 1: I think that's true when it's not pure when it's
Speaker 1: really about like you just want my kid to buy
Speaker 1: this thing, don't you. Then it's like it becomes too
Speaker 1: self conscious of like the things that's trying to do.
Speaker 1: But Mr Rogers is super pure. It's just like this
Speaker 1: is one person statement being supported by the team of
Speaker 1: people around him and somebody who works in TV. That's
Speaker 1: hard to do. Yeah. I was going to ask you
Speaker 1: about that, like as it has your understanding of what
Speaker 1: he was able to do change now that you are
Speaker 1: a maker of television. Yes, great, thank you, goodnight everyone. Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: I mean it's like it's hard to get everybody on
Speaker 1: you if you have everybody on the same page that
Speaker 1: they're all in service of of Mr Rogers. I still
Speaker 1: call Mr Rogers, you say Fred because you know him
Speaker 1: like that. But I've been called that only by black
Speaker 1: people on the show. I just want to point that out.
Speaker 1: White people have been like Fred, Red Fred. And then
Speaker 1: I had viewing and she was like, you know him
Speaker 1: like that exactly, Fred Rogers. Excuse me? Are you a
Speaker 1: son that I didn't know? Uh? Mr Rogers? Is that
Speaker 1: it's clear that like everybody was on the same page,
Speaker 1: or at least I knew that this was this is
Speaker 1: the voice I'm following. That's not that's not case nine
Speaker 1: percent the TV that's ever been made. That's not the
Speaker 1: case that they're not listening to one. For even some
Speaker 1: of the TV we like, it was like it was
Speaker 1: a nightmare back there, but when it happens, you can
Speaker 1: feel it. So for me, there's not much difference between Mr.
Speaker 1: Rogers and Atlanta. With Donald Glover, you could feel it
Speaker 1: like there's not much on that show that Donald Glover
Speaker 1: hasn't been like, check, it's funny, it's the Atlanta is
Speaker 1: a really interesting comparison, one that I had never made um,
Speaker 1: but that rings true for me, partially for what you
Speaker 1: said about the creative process, but also because both of
Speaker 1: those shows make a lot of use of space and silence,
Speaker 1: and they do this thing where they train the listeners
Speaker 1: to sit still long enough to start to feel and
Speaker 1: experience more subtle levels of what's going on. And they've
Speaker 1: built a lot of trust with the audience. So even
Speaker 1: if you're like, where's this going, he was like, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna sit here and see. And I think that's the
Speaker 1: important thing too, is that this that you when you
Speaker 1: build that trust with the audience, and that comes from
Speaker 1: the audience knowing I trust that, uh Mr Rogers or
Speaker 1: Mr Glover, I trust that these people have a plan
Speaker 1: because so many times you watch a lot of TV
Speaker 1: and it's like there's no plan. They just had to
Speaker 1: get this done. They just had to turn this in
Speaker 1: and there was a way which Mr Rogers did. There
Speaker 1: something that feels like we're here for one purpose. We're
Speaker 1: all pulling together and we're not trying to do something
Speaker 1: that is cooler, hip or trendy. We want to create
Speaker 1: an experience and have you joined us today and come
Speaker 1: back the next time. Also, I think talk, I mean
Speaker 1: I think against this from Mr Rogers. I think the
Speaker 1: reason why I respond to Mr Rogers because the way
Speaker 1: my mom treated me talking to your kids like their people,
Speaker 1: you know, like talking not talking to them like their kids. Like.
Speaker 1: Certainly Mr Rodgers as slows down because he's trying to
Speaker 1: makes you understand, but you feel like he's a friend
Speaker 1: of yours. And I think and for me as a parent,
Speaker 1: when you feel like you're like I'm the I'm your friend.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm the friend who pays the rent so
Speaker 1: every now and again to make some decisions. But really,
Speaker 1: I would rather us be friends. I would rather us
Speaker 1: talk through these problems instead of like, instead of me
Speaker 1: saying because I said, so, yeah, you know, it's interesting
Speaker 1: you bring up your mom and I met your mom
Speaker 1: and read her book, and um, she's a person with
Speaker 1: a very strong black identity, which is part of the
Speaker 1: way you were raised. And um, and I wonder when
Speaker 1: I talk to people about Fred Rogers. A lot of times, Uh,
Speaker 1: they'll they'll bring up in some way, depending on their race,
Speaker 1: a question about how I feel about him as a
Speaker 1: black man. In other words, the question I was actually
Speaker 1: talking with, of all people, Well, I'm not gonna name drop,
Speaker 1: but I was talking with someone I don't know. I
Speaker 1: was talking with someone in Cape God randomly that i'd
Speaker 1: run into, who is a known historian, And I said,
Speaker 1: I'm doing this thing in Fred Rogers. And he immediately
Speaker 1: said he was a white guy. He immediately said, how
Speaker 1: do black people feel about Fred Rogers? Just like sir.
Speaker 1: That's why I'm not gonna name drop, because I don't
Speaker 1: want to. I don't want to kill his book sales
Speaker 1: because this book is very important. But um, but that's
Speaker 1: the first thing he said, And uh, whatever, I stumbled
Speaker 1: through the answer also kind of annoyed and then excuse myself.
Speaker 1: But it did make me think about this inherent belief
Speaker 1: that somehow what Fred Rogers did was like doesn't work
Speaker 1: for blackness, or there is misaligned and like you know
Speaker 1: that's been I mean, in the famous Eddie Murphy sketch,
Speaker 1: that's sort of the premise of that joke is that
Speaker 1: if you did Fred Rogers in the black neighborhood, it
Speaker 1: might look like this. But I want to hear you
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about how people in this so funny.
Speaker 1: At the same time I was taking into Mr Rogers,
Speaker 1: I was also watching Eddie Murphy on The Stay Night.
Speaker 1: I never saw Eddie Murphy's Mr Robinsons Neighborhood as being
Speaker 1: critical of Mr Rogers. His portrayal of Mr Rogers felt
Speaker 1: like Mr Rogers, but an Eddie Murphy version of it.
Speaker 1: And also it never occurred to me that it was
Speaker 1: really the black version of Mr Rogers. It was just
Speaker 1: the the the this version of blackness of Mr Rosson,
Speaker 1: which is the thing white people do. That's the black version.
Speaker 1: None of that's like the hood criminal black version Rogers. Sorry,
Speaker 1: therefer criminal and black making news. So satists come out bell. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so again, Tucker Carlson again. So for me, it was
Speaker 1: just the idea that, like this is how this is
Speaker 1: Eddie Murphy. It was a love letter Mr Rogers. And
Speaker 1: when I watched Mr Rogers, I didn't watch him as
Speaker 1: a white guy. I watched him as Mr Rogers. And
Speaker 1: I think that's that's the thing. I think when a
Speaker 1: white person asked that question, they understand Black people and
Speaker 1: people of color can tell the difference between a white
Speaker 1: guy and Mr Rogers. If that show had been made
Speaker 1: for white kids, we would have been able to sniff
Speaker 1: it through. Doesn't feel like it's talking to me, but
Speaker 1: the fact is Mr Rogers was talking to all kids.
Speaker 1: I've been trying to get a black person to come
Speaker 1: on this show and say that Mr Rogers transcends race.
Speaker 1: Can I get you? Can I put you down for
Speaker 1: transcends race? The way that when Prince died, he transcended race.
Speaker 1: Remember printed Prince dying David Bowie died, was like, no,
Speaker 1: I said, David Bowie transcended race. Mr Rogers transcends his race. Wow,
Speaker 1: we got it, we got it. Clip. Uh. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: funny because I think a lot about um. I think
Speaker 1: a lot about this. He doesn't transcend race, he transcends
Speaker 1: his race. That's so that's an interesting distinction. Tell me
Speaker 1: more about that, just that he that he's so good
Speaker 1: that I don't even score him down for being white,
Speaker 1: that I don't I don't see him through through his whiteness,
Speaker 1: which I see a lot of people through their whiteness. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I Actually it's a really interesting point. No one had
Speaker 1: made that quite as articulately. You're so articulate. I don't know, Uh,
Speaker 1: no one's made that quite as articulately as you have.
Speaker 1: That there was something It wasn't that he transcended sort
Speaker 1: of the existence of race, but something about the way
Speaker 1: he presented himself didn't allow you to think of him
Speaker 1: just as a white guy period. And I wonder what
Speaker 1: that is, Like, I mean, part of me thinks that
Speaker 1: because he was trafficking in a certain kind of respect
Speaker 1: and kindness that typically we don't see associated with like
Speaker 1: your average run of the middle white person when interacting
Speaker 1: with like the rest of the world, or your average
Speaker 1: run of the middle kids show like there are a
Speaker 1: lot of times they're yelling, you know, they're they're not
Speaker 1: actually trying to connect they're trying to order, you know,
Speaker 1: like do this now, do this? Go buy it? Like
Speaker 1: it's very like shows, and he was just like he
Speaker 1: just wanted to sit with you, and it was clear
Speaker 1: he cared. And I mean, it's so hard to do
Speaker 1: through the TV camera when you're looking at the camera
Speaker 1: because he's literally looking at a camera. He's not looking
Speaker 1: at a person. And I know that too from having
Speaker 1: to look at camera when they say talk directly to
Speaker 1: the camera along He's like yeah, because you're looking at
Speaker 1: a box and you're looking at like half the camera
Speaker 1: guys shoulder and you know, and you're wondering if he's
Speaker 1: paying attention or whatever. How do you go about that?
Speaker 1: Because I was gonna ask you about that, like about
Speaker 1: similarities if any, that you see between Fred Rogers United Shades.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you can find that, but but
Speaker 1: just as you a person who has to like do
Speaker 1: a similar kind of work, which is I need to
Speaker 1: talk to people, need to reach people at home, how
Speaker 1: do you go about that technically? Like how do you
Speaker 1: think through that? The thing I think about his vulnerability,
Speaker 1: like if you're vulnerable on camera and if you let
Speaker 1: people know when you don't know or if you let
Speaker 1: people see you uh, if if you let people see
Speaker 1: you break, or if you let people see you like
Speaker 1: basically sweat, you know, there's like then they connect with
Speaker 1: you as on a human level. I'm trying to be clear,
Speaker 1: I'm not the expert here. I'm sitting with some experts,
Speaker 1: and I also don't always have the right opinion, and
Speaker 1: sometimes I mispronounced thing, and sometimes I I will say, so,
Speaker 1: we had a moment in a show we did last
Speaker 1: year in Salt Lake City and I sat down with
Speaker 1: a bunch of young people to talk about what was
Speaker 1: like like to be Mormon and me in the LGBTQ
Speaker 1: plus community. What's that like? And I said to one person,
Speaker 1: I said, well, as a gay man. And the person
Speaker 1: stops saying no, no no, no, I'm not a gay man.
Speaker 1: I'm intersex. And I was like, oh sorry, and the
Speaker 1: person was like, no, no big deal, Like basically happens
Speaker 1: all the time. And the first edit that came back
Speaker 1: from the production, they cut out the moment of my mistake,
Speaker 1: because that's what you're supposed to do in TV, cut
Speaker 1: out the mistakes. I was like, no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: that's real. That really happened. I'm not. If you cut
Speaker 1: it out, it looks like I always know what I'm
Speaker 1: talking about. To me, I like lean on the fact that,
Speaker 1: like I that the audience, to the cores in the
Speaker 1: show knows that I'm not trying to be the expert.
Speaker 1: So for me, Mr Rogers feels like a person who's
Speaker 1: making a TV show. He doesn't feel like the host
Speaker 1: of a TV show. And I talked about that with
Speaker 1: the United Shades. If I started to feel like I'm
Speaker 1: hosting the TV show, We're doing something wrong. Fred Rogers
Speaker 1: his work was very much of his time. He did
Speaker 1: something on TV that was on the one hand, very successful.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, almost no one else repeated it.
Speaker 1: I mean, in his legacy there's a small tradition, but
Speaker 1: for the large part, the rest of children television just
Speaker 1: became more manic, more insane, more And so I guess
Speaker 1: I wonder, assuming that you couldn't have that exact person
Speaker 1: appear right now in the twenty one century, what would
Speaker 1: have Fred Rogers of the century look like. You don't
Speaker 1: want somebody to repeat, You want somebody to stand on
Speaker 1: the shoulders of And also it means they may make
Speaker 1: it look differently, and so I do feel like like
Speaker 1: I think about like hair love the animated you know,
Speaker 1: you know so so Matthew Cherry wrote a book care
Speaker 1: Lovel about a black dad doing his daughter's hair, trying
Speaker 1: to learn how to do his his black daughter's hair.
Speaker 1: And I would say black twice just because it's possible
Speaker 1: for people to have kids of different races. So it
Speaker 1: just turned they turned into an animated feature. And it
Speaker 1: is that almost sounds like science fiction to me, that
Speaker 1: that's in a movie theater. And it's not like if
Speaker 1: you read the book, that's all it's about. It's not
Speaker 1: about and now we got to go fight a dragon,
Speaker 1: you know it's and it's not about like or some
Speaker 1: bad things gonna happen if I don't do your hair.
Speaker 1: The steaks are not that high. But for me, there's
Speaker 1: something about it that is pure. And that's what Mr
Speaker 1: rogers legacy is is the pureness of how to sort
Speaker 1: of like put out good content for kids in the
Speaker 1: world that is so pure that adults are excited about it.
Speaker 1: Given how expanse of his vision for love and acceptance
Speaker 1: in the world was, and given how uh shitty the
Speaker 1: world of the world is, do you think he was successful. Yes,
Speaker 1: because I think that this is the thing I said
Speaker 1: earlier about like when we're making when I'm making anything
Speaker 1: I'm making, whether it's a podcast or writing or you know, shades,
Speaker 1: when I'm writing it, I'm like, this is going to
Speaker 1: change the world just because you I think you have
Speaker 1: to feel that, have to feel that way. Every basketball
Speaker 1: player thinks that they're they're like top five all time.
Speaker 1: You have to think that, whereas why you out and
Speaker 1: why are stepping out there? But then when you get
Speaker 1: on the court, you just gotta make sure you're helping
Speaker 1: win the game. Like maybe in the gym by yourself
Speaker 1: your top five all time, or maybe when I'm home
Speaker 1: writing on my computer or if I'm making nice shades.
Speaker 1: I think this is going to be the thing that
Speaker 1: is like the definitive episode on reproductive justice in America.
Speaker 1: And then at the end you have to be I
Speaker 1: hope people watch it and talk about it, and I
Speaker 1: think Mr Rodgers one because people watched it and talked
Speaker 1: about it have been inspired by it. You know. I
Speaker 1: think that it's a big thing to do to make
Speaker 1: the world a more equitable, just loving place. That's a
Speaker 1: big task and you have to more people working on it.
Speaker 1: You know, at the same time he was working on it,
Speaker 1: there's a guy across town named Martin Luther King Jr.
Speaker 1: Who was also working on you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So like and they're different ways to do this. I
Speaker 1: don't want to call either one of them failures because
Speaker 1: because it didn't happen. I think that I believe, and
Speaker 1: there's not proof, right was that things move in a
Speaker 1: more equitable and just direction. They just don't always move consistently,
Speaker 1: and they don't always stay moving forward. Right now we're
Speaker 1: at a point where it's starting to move back. But
Speaker 1: I feel like in the long line of history took
Speaker 1: to paraphrase Dr King who stole it from a Quaker,
Speaker 1: the arc of history has been towards justice, but it
Speaker 1: hasn't always been consistently towards justice. And I think that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that the fact that we're sitting here talking
Speaker 1: about Mr Rogers, and in the fact that we're sort
Speaker 1: of deconstructing it too, black men talking with Mr Rogers.
Speaker 1: Mission accomplished? Do you? Um? My last question is, uh,
Speaker 1: if he were here, I would be crying. And after
Speaker 1: you composed yourself and stopped weeping and cleaned all this
Speaker 1: snot off of your face. Bubbles bubble clear snot bubbles.
Speaker 1: What would you ask him? What would I ask Mr Rogers?
Speaker 1: I guess the thing you do? You feel successful? I
Speaker 1: think that's the thing, because I think a lot of
Speaker 1: times people who are in on that side of it
Speaker 1: have very complicated things about what they've done. Sometimes it's like,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what you caught, what the world tells you.
Speaker 1: That's how do you feel inside? And so for me,
Speaker 1: if he felt like nope, I would make me said,
Speaker 1: I've been thinking about that a lot too. Was Fred successful?
Speaker 1: Did Fred feel successful? Next time we'll explore the ways
Speaker 1: in which he was, but also the many ways in
Speaker 1: which he wasn't. I went up to get him to
Speaker 1: come down to the studio and he was. He was
Speaker 1: a mess. He said, why am I doing? These? Aren't
Speaker 1: going to do any good finding Fred is produced by
Speaker 1: Transmitter Media. Our team is Dan O'donnald, Jordan Bailey, and
Speaker 1: Maddie Foley. Our editor is Sarah Nicks. The executive producer
Speaker 1: for Transmitter Media is Greta Cone. Executive producers at Fatherly
Speaker 1: are Simon Isaacs and Andrew Berman. Thanks to the team
Speaker 1: at I Heart Media. Our show is mixed by Rick Kwan,
Speaker 1: music by Blue Dot Sessions and Alison Layton Brown. I'm
Speaker 1: Carla Wallace. Thank you for listening. The book up to bocket, Comboku,
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Speaker 1: up to book bottom book book