February 19, 2023 • 26 mins
The History Channel honors Black History Month with the new documentary "Can't Turn Us Around: Alabama's Foot Soldiers" premiering this Wednesday, February 22 at 7PM eastern. Host Theo EJ Wilson joins Ramses to discuss this program and share his unique connection to the documentary.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The History Channel recently announced a new powerful one hour documentary,
Han't Turn Us Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers, premiering Wednesday, February
at seven pm Eastern Time. Hosted by community activist and
grandson of a Tuskegee Airmen, the documentary highlights brave Black
American citizens who put everything on the line by for
(00:21):
their rights across crucial battleground cities in Alabama in celebration
of Black History Mom. Today's guest will speak more in
depth about this musty documentary and its historical importance without
further ado. Today's guest is the host of Can't Turn
Us Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers, community activist and grandson of
a Tuscagee Airmen, Mr THEO. E. J. Wilson. I am
(00:45):
Maggie B. Nowen and this is the Black Information Network
Daily Podcast with your host rams Is jaw all right,
Mr Wilson, Welcome to the show. How are you doing, man?
Are you doing? Ms? Thank you for having me, sir,
absolutely absolutely, you've been Uh, I've been busy man. You've
been working on some some stuff. I'm excited about it.
So before we get to that, let's start at the beginning.
(01:07):
What we do on this show is we like to
introduce you to our listeners, and then one can do
that better than you. So let's talk a bit about
your background and sort of everything that led you to
working on this film. Yes, sir Um, I'm an activist
and that kind of runs in my family. My father
(01:29):
new Malcolm X on a personal level when he began
the organization of Afro American Unity. My grandfather was the
Tuskegee Airman, Theobald Wilson of the ninety nine Airborne and uh,
I kind of just grew up with activism in the
milieu of the household that I came up in. And
so when I was twenty two, after I graduated from college,
(01:51):
I survived the police brutality incident and that kind of
bewildered me, traumatized me, but gave me the desire to
find a way to reach the world, and the best
way was through my voice. Began slam poetry, and slam
poetry led back into some activism that I had kind
of let go of when I was a teenager, and
(02:13):
that was just in time for the Black Lives Matter
movement and our barbershop talks began to spin off into
a lot of other necessary activists work here in Denver, Colorado,
including some online stuff which led to a TED talk,
which led to the TV. And that's the fastest I
can break that down. So you if you one more details,
we'll just go into those. Oh well, listen, We're going
(02:34):
to get them details, because I want to tell you something. Yeah,
um uh A long time ago. This might have been
maybe five years ago. UM, I came across the TED
talk that you mentioned and I watched I rewatched it again.
It might have been yesterday because I knew we would
be talking today. And UM, I think that that is
(02:56):
very important. I don't want to to to go in
too much into detail because I would love to pret
to share a little bit about that with the listeners.
But UM, I recognize that, uh from what you did.
So I host a radio show myself where I deal
with um, you know, social justice issues, right, and I
recognized that I myself could very much end up in
(03:20):
my own little online echo chamber A and B. I
need to know what the opposition was, UM saying, right,
And my show started in the past two years, but
I got the framework about five years ago from that
one TED talk. So you had an impact on my
life and the and the framework of my show because
I had to subscribe to some pretty wild stuff or
(03:42):
to make sure that I was getting I knew what
what they were talking about. And I don't want to
go into too much detail, because I want you to
explain your Ted talk in brief for the listeners. Um,
and and of course let's point them to the Ted
Talk itself so that they can get a little bit
more about it. So please, What was the Ted talk about?
Was so much fun? Listen? That ten talk is called
A Black Man goes undercover in the right I was
(04:07):
if we rewind in really taking to the streets with
the Black Lives Matter protests, and I realized that I
could probably have more impact if I began to make
content that went online. I went viral with the video
when I kind of did the Cliff Knows version of
Ton of Hassey coaches the Case for Reparations. From that,
(04:27):
my platform grew and I began to get trolled by
white supremacists who were saying, oh, a manner of evil
to me, and I began to realize that they were
getting different facts. I didn't understand Echo Chambers. Nobody was
talking about Echo Chambers in Uh. People thought that we
were seeing the world online as it really was. And
so I created a fake profile because I found out
(04:50):
that there were white supremacists creating the profiles on black Twitter.
So I was like, well, you can play that guy.
So in doing that, I was like, okay, oh, they're
getting information that is completely different than what I'm getting.
And there is a spectrum of radicalization here. There's a spectrum, right,
(05:10):
There's basically you can boil it down to two kind
of actors at the alt right, in the alright movement
at that time. One was the completely radicalized, vitriolic, hateful person,
the person who was beyond redemption, who might commit a
hate grind one day. Ain't know making friends with that
kind of person. But then there was the average guy,
perhaps a white guy in the middle of the country.
He was like, listen, man, make it makes sense. The
(05:32):
president is black. I would love to wake up Lebron
Lebron James's bank account. And I see all of this
violent stuff on the news with gang members explaining to
me this black Lives Matter thing. That person is open
to a conversation. And if you talk to anybody who
has been brought out of white supremacist hate groups, they
will say that the most powerful tool is relational de radicalization, right,
(05:57):
And so coming from Malcolm X's Camp school of thought,
that was a that was a hard bridge for me
to cross. But I realized that, um, you can do
a lot more when it comes to actually conversation then
you can do with violence at a certain place in
the radicalization spectrum. And so I'm not a violent guy,
(06:18):
and I figured that if there's a conversation to be
had me as somebody from the left needs to at
least had a door open, I might be missing something absolutely,
And and again I appreciate that that framework. I think
having that knowledge, that baseline knowledge of how to set
up a program where you're dealing with those issues and
approaching them and dealing with algorithms and dealing with opposition
(06:41):
and people that really are hateful and other people still
who are potentially open having a conversation and recognizing their
fears and you know what it is that they're concerned about.
That obviously has had an impact on not just me,
I'm sure many other people. So your work, your reputation
procede you and your work obviously has has been very
(07:01):
much impactful UM and and today we're talking about UM
this this film can't turn us around Alabama Split Soldiers.
So one of the things that you mentioned, and one
of the things that I definitely want to touch on,
is your grandfather, the Tuskegee Airman. So tell us a
bit about his story. Yeah, Grandpa is uh. He was
(07:25):
a Jamaican immigrant. He was born in America. Both his
parents were Jamaican origin, and he was good with his hands,
and he came up doing a great depression. He was
born a hundred years ago in ninety three, and there
were a lot there were not a lot of options
open to him. He graduated high school and he just
heard about a program where he might be able to
(07:48):
work with airplanes. That's all he understood it as. But
it would involve him going to Tuskegee, Alabama, and he
became a Tuskegee Airmen almost by happenstance. When I read
his writing, it was like he was more prone to engineering.
So there's the pilots who get all the glory. But
a part of the Tuskegee airmand program was the guys
(08:09):
on the ground making things work, mechanics, repairman, even folks
who sold parachutes for the people who were actually going
up on the missions. His parachutes saved about twenty two lives.
They were all deployed successfully. And then they also saw
ground combat in Germany, which he actually participated in. UM.
Really bullets to bullet fighting against the Nazis. So you know,
(08:33):
they used those brothers for everything, and it just it
just was what it was. And I'll just in this
portion with saying that he was astounded where he had
the experience where he saw German POWs treated better than
he was. He remembered that to his dying day, and
he wrote about that how that affected him, how he
(08:56):
had done all this stuff in the country and yet
the Nazis were captured and who he got a chance
to see were being treated better than he was as
he sacrificed for the country. That's great, you know, um
I uh, I can't imagine the amount that we could
learn um from his story. There's there's so much there
(09:18):
that lived experience, UM. The and and really the journey
that helped shape the path that we're on today or
helped kind of define the direction that we're walking in. UM.
But you know, we're doing a little something here with
this film, so for our listeners in brief, tell us
a bit about Can't Turn Us Around, Alabama's Foot Soldiers
and why you believe it's important for people to watch
(09:41):
it got you so Can't Turn Us Around? It was
a project begun I believe nine years ago by our
director Andrew Kannazario, and he began to really start putting
together the story of the quote little people who did
the big things, the folks who don't have the big
names but had the big impact, and he put together
but the project got put on the back burner after
(10:03):
my other History Channel show I was there came out
for some reason. We ended up crossing paths and he said,
let's really go down there and make this a complete project.
And just me being a community activists, um, I guess
lent itself to it because I got a certain sensitivity
to the information and it's a beautiful documentary. It's impactful
(10:26):
and when we were on the ground in Alabama, I'll
say we ran into some of the original foot Soldiers,
many of whom were in their nineties at this point
in the time, right at the foot of the Edmund
Pettis Bridge, right there talking to folks anybody who wants
who would listen about the nuances of the civil rights
movement that didn't make it into the history books, and
this documentary is there to correct the record. And I'm
(10:49):
assuming that that was more or less the inspiration for
making the film in the first place, right, correct. I
think that when you look at the people who really
put their next out there, Um, Andrew was sensitive to that,
and he really wanted the story told the right way,
and he brought me in to help complete that. And
it was really a great thing. I think you guys
(11:11):
are gonna love it. And it's honest. It's this is
not a McDonald's version of civil rights. This is gritty
and it's truthful, and I like that. Okay, so how
about this. There are people, as you know, who say, hey, listen, man,
why do we keep looking back? Why aren't we looking forward? Um?
(11:32):
You know these people, they're they're not my favorite people
that they exist, right, we want them to become educated
to But um, for those people who we want them
to make time for something like this. If they were
to ask why is this film relevant in what would
you say to them? I would say, knowing history prevents
(11:53):
you from being the bad guy. As history is written today,
you have to understand that America is the land of forgetting.
Like even European immigrants that came over here, we're beating
out of speaking their native European language, whether it be
German or Gaelic, if they were Irish, Italian or Polish.
Let alone our journey to the America's and what we
(12:14):
were forced to give up. America hates history, I can't say,
at least culturally speaking. And that's because our history does
not square with the hero story that we tell ourselves.
But it can. Here's the most important thing, and I'm
gonna refer to my grandfather's version of patriotism to answer
(12:35):
this question completely. Grandpa was a patriot. He had seen
everything that could make somebody hate this country, and he
loved this country in any way. But he loved this
country in a way that incorporated its dark side, incorporated
its shadows, incorporated all the things that was wrong with
the instants. If we look at this, all of these
(12:58):
things that America got wrong, we'll give us the nuggets
of of light to get it right this next time.
But if we're too afraid to look at that, it's
like loving a person. If you can't love a person
in all of their flaws, all of their dark side,
all of the things that are wrong with that person,
do you really truly love that person? Well, if you
can't really look at the dark side of America, do
(13:20):
you really love America? Right? And the promise that America
has for us? My grandfather did. But in order to
do that, you've gotta look at the rough stuff, and
you gotta be able to say America is both sixteen
nineteen and seventeen seventy six. It is both freedom fighter
and freedom taker. It is both colonizer and revolutionary. It
(13:41):
is both of these things. Like we are all of
these things, and that completes the picture of America. But
you've got to incorporate the dark colors and the light
and that's patriotism. And that's why you should watch films
like this. We are here today with the host of
Can't Turn Us Around? All Bama's foot Soldiers, community activists,
(14:02):
and grandson of a Taskayee Airmen. Mr THEO. E. J. Wilson. Now,
I'm I'm assuming that you probably have some strong opinions
on a recent round of attacks on what has become
(14:24):
known as critical race theory. When in fact it is
American history. So I'd love to get your thoughts on,
in particular the attacks in uh, the recent attacks in
Florida on teaching our children the full story of American history.
And then now I believe it's either Missouri or Mississippi
where they're kind of launching a new separate campaign and
(14:44):
in fact offering teachers a bonus so they do have money,
go figure a bonus to teach patriotism. So, um, what
are your thoughts on these, uh, this pushback against teaching
American dream Oh, Florida, Florida, Florida. You know, I went
to Florida A and M University in Tallahassee, six blocks
(15:06):
away from where Rhonda Santis has his desk, and I'm
gonna tell you something. Number One, on the ground in Florida,
they're fighting back. But number two, it's sad. It is
sad because one thing I asked that people who are
upset about quote unquote critical race theory, which is actually
just decolonized American history, is if you never personally whipped,
(15:28):
enslaved or like brutalize anybody, why are you taking the
stories of those who did so personally? Why are you
taking it so personally. If you never enslaved anybody, if
you never committed genocide, why do those stories of those
who did affect you support so so personally? America forgot
about the Daughters of the American Confederacy. These women were
(15:52):
literally the daughters of the Confederate soldiers who created historical
movement to rewrite the South und favorable light is early
as the seventies. They're the only people who lost a
war but were on the narrative, and the Daughters of
the American Confederacy have been skewing our view of not
(16:12):
only the Civil War, but of all of American history
since the inception of public school. So what we're doing
if they understood that, if you understood that you're not
fighting indoctrine nation, you're defending your own, is to say
this history, to de colonized rougher narrative of America is
(16:34):
giving you an opportunity like none other you've ever been offered,
and that is to see yourself accurately and to make
new choices. I say to the folks who are fighting
against supposed critical race theory, is the answer two. Feeling
guilty about those who suppressed black voices in the past
(16:58):
to suppress them again today. Is that the answer, Because
if you don't understand who the bad guys of history were,
you could likely become the bad guys of history tomorrow.
Do not be somebody who your descendants feel ashamed about
and want to distance themselves from. Where they're offering you
(17:22):
a rocky story, man. We're offering you a story to
get it right. Yeah, and that's what I think is
most powerful. And if they do not see that, they
will once again be the bull Connors. They will once again,
you know, be the George Wallace's, they will once again
be all of the people who through rocks of dr
(17:42):
king not realizing that they're doing it to the ones
of this generation. That's heavy. So UM, I appreciate you
sharing that because obviously that's something that we talk about
here on the Black Information Network quite a bit. We're
defenders to teaching the right story and UM making sure
(18:04):
that our people are educated and indeed all people are educated.
And you know, to your point, there's there's something that
I came across recently, and that's that it's the realization,
if you will, that UM slavery benefited more than just
the slaveholders because it was a slave economy. The economy
allowed other people who themselves didn't own slaves to get jobs,
(18:28):
to own land, to pass on land, this sort of thing.
And then when you couple that with you know, the
redlining efforts in the early nineteen hundreds and uh, you know, uh, well,
let's go back black codes, you know, land theft um
and you know Jim Crow and all that sort of stuff,
and then fast forward to the redlining. And then you
(18:49):
know again in two thousand and eight during the financial crisis,
when we saw the biggest UM subtraction of black wealth
and modern history. UM, you realize that there are some
connections to UM slavery, and there are some beneficiaries of slavery,
even those who did not themselves, UM participate in slavery,
(19:11):
whose families ancestors than your own slaves. And so UM,
I applaud you, sir. I applaud your response, and I
appreciate that. Now with that in mind, UM, this film
we're taking a particular look at UM Alabama's foot soldiers.
So let's ask it like this, what do you hope
(19:33):
that viewers will take away from the film? Uh? And
maybe the second part would be, UM, why why are
we highlighting Alabama. I think that I want them to
take away how darn relevant it is today. It shouldn't
be the this film should not be this relevant. It
(19:57):
shouldn't be. And I want them to take courage and
take heart that at least the Alabama foot Soldiers laid
down a blueprint for you. They did it with no blueprint,
no blueprint whatsoever. When you realize what violence and acceptable
(20:18):
brutality they were up against back in those days, you
realize the heart it took not to hit back. And
this is somebody I'm just gonna get personal right now.
I'm a trained fighter, man, I'm you know what I mean, Like,
I've adjusted my body to combat, right. But here's one
of the things I had to acknowledge about the power
(20:40):
of non violence. Non violence. Non violence shows you who
the bad guy is. Non violence. By not hitting back,
you have established to moral high ground. And I'm talking
about I would feel more comfortable going in through a
position that they went in knowing that I could hit back,
rather than knowing that I couldn't. That takes guts, man,
(21:02):
I guess somebody who can do this, It takes guts,
And I applaud my elders, and I applaud the Allies.
I hope that people of European descent see the white
allies who took science because their lives were under threat too.
You know, one of the key enforcers of white supremacy
(21:24):
was that there was a covert message. And they're telling
white folks, don't you grow no conscience? Now, don't you
get to siding with them, don't be in love it.
Don't do nothing of that, because what we'll do is
show up at your door and you'll get the same
fate as they do. And they did, And so I
hope they see that no matter what it looks like now,
(21:46):
they ain't facing what they was facing back then. And
if there are similarities in the battles, take some of
these tactics, take some of his courage and keep on fighting,
because Donne they would if they were facing the opposition
that we face today. Wow. Um, obviously you paint a
very vivid picture. Um, and we're really excited about the
(22:10):
film's premiere. Um. So before we let you go, UM,
not only should uh do, I want to ask you to,
you know, plug the film, but I also want you
to plug that Ted talk and your social media and
and how folks can support you, you know, personally, anything
else that you got going. Let's make sure that folks
can happen. Alright, cool, Thank you very much. The film
(22:33):
is Can't Turn Us Around. Um, it's I believe, premiering
next Wednesday, seven pm Eastern. I honestly got to give
a shout out to History each channel because I've seen
them and I've been watching History Channel for for for
over a decade, man, and they're taking they're taking a
(22:54):
stand to tell it like it is like some somebody
up there under of stands the more responsibility. If I
look at the documentaries that they used to make about
presidents versus the ones they aired last year, there's a
lot more honesty and accuracy in those. There's a lot
more corporation, there's a lot more humanization of the black perspective,
(23:15):
and there's a lot more effort to be real about
decolonizing the narrative right. And and this is something I'm
not I'm just saying this because I've been watching for
so long, So I gotta give them props. And this
is a part of that first and foremost. Next, Um,
I am THEO. E. J. Wilson on Instagram. It's all
one word, no doubts, no underscores, THEO E. J. Wilson,
(23:38):
and um yeah, it's uh, this is gonna be a
powerful one because this is gonna be something that is
sadly all too relevant, which means it actually takes more
courage today to air something like this and they would
have even two or three years ago. Okay, um, and
then uh, just because I want people, Oh yeah yeah,
(24:02):
the black man on the cover. Oh yeah yeah, Okay,
So it's um, a black man goes undercover in the right,
And I think a good follow up to that is
another one I did called Requiem for Alonso. Okay, there's
another one called Requiem for Alonso that I did with
Ted xml High back in talking about my friend who
I lost to police brutality, which is I think a
(24:24):
lot more current. We did that during George George Floyd summer.
So those two A black Man Goes Undercover in the
all right and Requiem for Alonso excellent. Okay, Well, I
appreciate you sharing all that. Um, I know that uh
for our listeners are gonna tap in, but um, I
definitely I am excited to to check out this this film.
(24:46):
So again, I'd like to thank you very much for
coming on and sharing it inside today and of course
your commitment to h educating our people and all people
once again. Today's guest is the host of Can't Turn
Us Around alaba Us Foot Soldiers, also a community activisation,
of course, the grandson of the Tuskegee Airmen Extraordinaire UH, THEO. E. J. Wilson.
(25:10):
Thank you again, sir, Thank you, Ray appreciate it. I'm
Maggie b Nowen and today I'll leave you with this.
Can't Turn Us Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers premieres Wednesday, February
at seven pm Eastern Time on the History Channel and
streams the next day on the History Channel app. In
(25:31):
honor of June tenth. An extended version of the documentary
will be available to stream beginning Friday June on the
History Vault, the network subscription video service. Can't Turn Us
Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers is produced for the History Channel
and History Vault. For more information, please visit History dot
com Forward Slash Specials. This has been a production of
(25:52):
the Black Information Network. Today's show is produced by Chris Thompson.
If you have any thoughts you'd like to share use
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be sure to hit subscribe and download all of our episodes.
Find your daily podcast host at ramsays Shaw on all
social media. We look forward to your joining us tomorrow
(26:14):
as we share our news with our voice from our
perspective right here on the Black Information Network Daily Podcast
The History Channel recently announced a new powerful one hour documentary,
Han't Turn Us Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers, premiering Wednesday, February
at seven pm Eastern Time. Hosted by community activist and
grandson of a Tuskegee Airmen, the documentary highlights brave Black
American citizens who put everything on the line by for
(00:21):
their rights across crucial battleground cities in Alabama in celebration
of Black History Mom. Today's guest will speak more in
depth about this musty documentary and its historical importance without
further ado. Today's guest is the host of Can't Turn
Us Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers, community activist and grandson of
a Tuscagee Airmen, Mr THEO. E. J. Wilson. I am
(00:45):
Maggie B. Nowen and this is the Black Information Network
Daily Podcast with your host rams Is jaw all right,
Mr Wilson, Welcome to the show. How are you doing, man?
Are you doing? Ms? Thank you for having me, sir,
absolutely absolutely, you've been Uh, I've been busy man. You've
been working on some some stuff. I'm excited about it.
So before we get to that, let's start at the beginning.
(01:07):
What we do on this show is we like to
introduce you to our listeners, and then one can do
that better than you. So let's talk a bit about
your background and sort of everything that led you to
working on this film. Yes, sir Um, I'm an activist
and that kind of runs in my family. My father
(01:29):
new Malcolm X on a personal level when he began
the organization of Afro American Unity. My grandfather was the
Tuskegee Airman, Theobald Wilson of the ninety nine Airborne and uh,
I kind of just grew up with activism in the
milieu of the household that I came up in. And
so when I was twenty two, after I graduated from college,
(01:51):
I survived the police brutality incident and that kind of
bewildered me, traumatized me, but gave me the desire to
find a way to reach the world, and the best
way was through my voice. Began slam poetry, and slam
poetry led back into some activism that I had kind
of let go of when I was a teenager, and
(02:13):
that was just in time for the Black Lives Matter
movement and our barbershop talks began to spin off into
a lot of other necessary activists work here in Denver, Colorado,
including some online stuff which led to a TED talk,
which led to the TV. And that's the fastest I
can break that down. So you if you one more details,
we'll just go into those. Oh well, listen, We're going
(02:34):
to get them details, because I want to tell you something. Yeah,
um uh A long time ago. This might have been
maybe five years ago. UM, I came across the TED
talk that you mentioned and I watched I rewatched it again.
It might have been yesterday because I knew we would
be talking today. And UM, I think that that is
(02:56):
very important. I don't want to to to go in
too much into detail because I would love to pret
to share a little bit about that with the listeners.
But UM, I recognize that, uh from what you did.
So I host a radio show myself where I deal
with um, you know, social justice issues, right, and I
recognized that I myself could very much end up in
(03:20):
my own little online echo chamber A and B. I
need to know what the opposition was, UM saying, right,
And my show started in the past two years, but
I got the framework about five years ago from that
one TED talk. So you had an impact on my
life and the and the framework of my show because
I had to subscribe to some pretty wild stuff or
(03:42):
to make sure that I was getting I knew what
what they were talking about. And I don't want to
go into too much detail, because I want you to
explain your Ted talk in brief for the listeners. Um,
and and of course let's point them to the Ted
Talk itself so that they can get a little bit
more about it. So please, What was the Ted talk about?
Was so much fun? Listen? That ten talk is called
A Black Man goes undercover in the right I was
(04:07):
if we rewind in really taking to the streets with
the Black Lives Matter protests, and I realized that I
could probably have more impact if I began to make
content that went online. I went viral with the video
when I kind of did the Cliff Knows version of
Ton of Hassey coaches the Case for Reparations. From that,
(04:27):
my platform grew and I began to get trolled by
white supremacists who were saying, oh, a manner of evil
to me, and I began to realize that they were
getting different facts. I didn't understand Echo Chambers. Nobody was
talking about Echo Chambers in Uh. People thought that we
were seeing the world online as it really was. And
so I created a fake profile because I found out
(04:50):
that there were white supremacists creating the profiles on black Twitter.
So I was like, well, you can play that guy.
So in doing that, I was like, okay, oh, they're
getting information that is completely different than what I'm getting.
And there is a spectrum of radicalization here. There's a spectrum, right,
(05:10):
There's basically you can boil it down to two kind
of actors at the alt right, in the alright movement
at that time. One was the completely radicalized, vitriolic, hateful person,
the person who was beyond redemption, who might commit a
hate grind one day. Ain't know making friends with that
kind of person. But then there was the average guy,
perhaps a white guy in the middle of the country.
He was like, listen, man, make it makes sense. The
(05:32):
president is black. I would love to wake up Lebron
Lebron James's bank account. And I see all of this
violent stuff on the news with gang members explaining to
me this black Lives Matter thing. That person is open
to a conversation. And if you talk to anybody who
has been brought out of white supremacist hate groups, they
will say that the most powerful tool is relational de radicalization, right,
(05:57):
And so coming from Malcolm X's Camp school of thought,
that was a that was a hard bridge for me
to cross. But I realized that, um, you can do
a lot more when it comes to actually conversation then
you can do with violence at a certain place in
the radicalization spectrum. And so I'm not a violent guy,
(06:18):
and I figured that if there's a conversation to be
had me as somebody from the left needs to at
least had a door open, I might be missing something absolutely,
And and again I appreciate that that framework. I think
having that knowledge, that baseline knowledge of how to set
up a program where you're dealing with those issues and
approaching them and dealing with algorithms and dealing with opposition
(06:41):
and people that really are hateful and other people still
who are potentially open having a conversation and recognizing their
fears and you know what it is that they're concerned about.
That obviously has had an impact on not just me,
I'm sure many other people. So your work, your reputation
procede you and your work obviously has has been very
(07:01):
much impactful UM and and today we're talking about UM
this this film can't turn us around Alabama Split Soldiers.
So one of the things that you mentioned, and one
of the things that I definitely want to touch on,
is your grandfather, the Tuskegee Airman. So tell us a
bit about his story. Yeah, Grandpa is uh. He was
(07:25):
a Jamaican immigrant. He was born in America. Both his
parents were Jamaican origin, and he was good with his hands,
and he came up doing a great depression. He was
born a hundred years ago in ninety three, and there
were a lot there were not a lot of options
open to him. He graduated high school and he just
heard about a program where he might be able to
(07:48):
work with airplanes. That's all he understood it as. But
it would involve him going to Tuskegee, Alabama, and he
became a Tuskegee Airmen almost by happenstance. When I read
his writing, it was like he was more prone to engineering.
So there's the pilots who get all the glory. But
a part of the Tuskegee airmand program was the guys
(08:09):
on the ground making things work, mechanics, repairman, even folks
who sold parachutes for the people who were actually going
up on the missions. His parachutes saved about twenty two lives.
They were all deployed successfully. And then they also saw
ground combat in Germany, which he actually participated in. UM.
Really bullets to bullet fighting against the Nazis. So you know,
(08:33):
they used those brothers for everything, and it just it
just was what it was. And I'll just in this
portion with saying that he was astounded where he had
the experience where he saw German POWs treated better than
he was. He remembered that to his dying day, and
he wrote about that how that affected him, how he
(08:56):
had done all this stuff in the country and yet
the Nazis were captured and who he got a chance
to see were being treated better than he was as
he sacrificed for the country. That's great, you know, um
I uh, I can't imagine the amount that we could
learn um from his story. There's there's so much there
(09:18):
that lived experience, UM. The and and really the journey
that helped shape the path that we're on today or
helped kind of define the direction that we're walking in. UM.
But you know, we're doing a little something here with
this film, so for our listeners in brief, tell us
a bit about Can't Turn Us Around, Alabama's Foot Soldiers
and why you believe it's important for people to watch
(09:41):
it got you so Can't Turn Us Around? It was
a project begun I believe nine years ago by our
director Andrew Kannazario, and he began to really start putting
together the story of the quote little people who did
the big things, the folks who don't have the big
names but had the big impact, and he put together
but the project got put on the back burner after
(10:03):
my other History Channel show I was there came out
for some reason. We ended up crossing paths and he said,
let's really go down there and make this a complete project.
And just me being a community activists, um, I guess
lent itself to it because I got a certain sensitivity
to the information and it's a beautiful documentary. It's impactful
(10:26):
and when we were on the ground in Alabama, I'll
say we ran into some of the original foot Soldiers,
many of whom were in their nineties at this point
in the time, right at the foot of the Edmund
Pettis Bridge, right there talking to folks anybody who wants
who would listen about the nuances of the civil rights
movement that didn't make it into the history books, and
this documentary is there to correct the record. And I'm
(10:49):
assuming that that was more or less the inspiration for
making the film in the first place, right, correct. I
think that when you look at the people who really
put their next out there, Um, Andrew was sensitive to that,
and he really wanted the story told the right way,
and he brought me in to help complete that. And
it was really a great thing. I think you guys
(11:11):
are gonna love it. And it's honest. It's this is
not a McDonald's version of civil rights. This is gritty
and it's truthful, and I like that. Okay, so how
about this. There are people, as you know, who say, hey, listen, man,
why do we keep looking back? Why aren't we looking forward? Um?
(11:32):
You know these people, they're they're not my favorite people
that they exist, right, we want them to become educated
to But um, for those people who we want them
to make time for something like this. If they were
to ask why is this film relevant in what would
you say to them? I would say, knowing history prevents
(11:53):
you from being the bad guy. As history is written today,
you have to understand that America is the land of forgetting.
Like even European immigrants that came over here, we're beating
out of speaking their native European language, whether it be
German or Gaelic, if they were Irish, Italian or Polish.
Let alone our journey to the America's and what we
(12:14):
were forced to give up. America hates history, I can't say,
at least culturally speaking. And that's because our history does
not square with the hero story that we tell ourselves.
But it can. Here's the most important thing, and I'm
gonna refer to my grandfather's version of patriotism to answer
(12:35):
this question completely. Grandpa was a patriot. He had seen
everything that could make somebody hate this country, and he
loved this country in any way. But he loved this
country in a way that incorporated its dark side, incorporated
its shadows, incorporated all the things that was wrong with
the instants. If we look at this, all of these
(12:58):
things that America got wrong, we'll give us the nuggets
of of light to get it right this next time.
But if we're too afraid to look at that, it's
like loving a person. If you can't love a person
in all of their flaws, all of their dark side,
all of the things that are wrong with that person,
do you really truly love that person? Well, if you
can't really look at the dark side of America, do
(13:20):
you really love America? Right? And the promise that America
has for us? My grandfather did. But in order to
do that, you've gotta look at the rough stuff, and
you gotta be able to say America is both sixteen
nineteen and seventeen seventy six. It is both freedom fighter
and freedom taker. It is both colonizer and revolutionary. It
(13:41):
is both of these things. Like we are all of
these things, and that completes the picture of America. But
you've got to incorporate the dark colors and the light
and that's patriotism. And that's why you should watch films
like this. We are here today with the host of
Can't Turn Us Around? All Bama's foot Soldiers, community activists,
(14:02):
and grandson of a Taskayee Airmen. Mr THEO. E. J. Wilson. Now,
I'm I'm assuming that you probably have some strong opinions
on a recent round of attacks on what has become
(14:24):
known as critical race theory. When in fact it is
American history. So I'd love to get your thoughts on,
in particular the attacks in uh, the recent attacks in
Florida on teaching our children the full story of American history.
And then now I believe it's either Missouri or Mississippi
where they're kind of launching a new separate campaign and
(14:44):
in fact offering teachers a bonus so they do have money,
go figure a bonus to teach patriotism. So, um, what
are your thoughts on these, uh, this pushback against teaching
American dream Oh, Florida, Florida, Florida. You know, I went
to Florida A and M University in Tallahassee, six blocks
(15:06):
away from where Rhonda Santis has his desk, and I'm
gonna tell you something. Number One, on the ground in Florida,
they're fighting back. But number two, it's sad. It is
sad because one thing I asked that people who are
upset about quote unquote critical race theory, which is actually
just decolonized American history, is if you never personally whipped,
(15:28):
enslaved or like brutalize anybody, why are you taking the
stories of those who did so personally? Why are you
taking it so personally. If you never enslaved anybody, if
you never committed genocide, why do those stories of those
who did affect you support so so personally? America forgot
about the Daughters of the American Confederacy. These women were
(15:52):
literally the daughters of the Confederate soldiers who created historical
movement to rewrite the South und favorable light is early
as the seventies. They're the only people who lost a
war but were on the narrative, and the Daughters of
the American Confederacy have been skewing our view of not
(16:12):
only the Civil War, but of all of American history
since the inception of public school. So what we're doing
if they understood that, if you understood that you're not
fighting indoctrine nation, you're defending your own, is to say
this history, to de colonized rougher narrative of America is
(16:34):
giving you an opportunity like none other you've ever been offered,
and that is to see yourself accurately and to make
new choices. I say to the folks who are fighting
against supposed critical race theory, is the answer two. Feeling
guilty about those who suppressed black voices in the past
(16:58):
to suppress them again today. Is that the answer, Because
if you don't understand who the bad guys of history were,
you could likely become the bad guys of history tomorrow.
Do not be somebody who your descendants feel ashamed about
and want to distance themselves from. Where they're offering you
(17:22):
a rocky story, man. We're offering you a story to
get it right. Yeah, and that's what I think is
most powerful. And if they do not see that, they
will once again be the bull Connors. They will once again,
you know, be the George Wallace's, they will once again
be all of the people who through rocks of dr
(17:42):
king not realizing that they're doing it to the ones
of this generation. That's heavy. So UM, I appreciate you
sharing that because obviously that's something that we talk about
here on the Black Information Network quite a bit. We're
defenders to teaching the right story and UM making sure
(18:04):
that our people are educated and indeed all people are educated.
And you know, to your point, there's there's something that
I came across recently, and that's that it's the realization,
if you will, that UM slavery benefited more than just
the slaveholders because it was a slave economy. The economy
allowed other people who themselves didn't own slaves to get jobs,
(18:28):
to own land, to pass on land, this sort of thing.
And then when you couple that with you know, the
redlining efforts in the early nineteen hundreds and uh, you know, uh, well,
let's go back black codes, you know, land theft um
and you know Jim Crow and all that sort of stuff,
and then fast forward to the redlining. And then you
(18:49):
know again in two thousand and eight during the financial crisis,
when we saw the biggest UM subtraction of black wealth
and modern history. UM, you realize that there are some
connections to UM slavery, and there are some beneficiaries of slavery,
even those who did not themselves, UM participate in slavery,
(19:11):
whose families ancestors than your own slaves. And so UM,
I applaud you, sir. I applaud your response, and I
appreciate that. Now with that in mind, UM, this film
we're taking a particular look at UM Alabama's foot soldiers.
So let's ask it like this, what do you hope
(19:33):
that viewers will take away from the film? Uh? And
maybe the second part would be, UM, why why are
we highlighting Alabama. I think that I want them to
take away how darn relevant it is today. It shouldn't
be the this film should not be this relevant. It
(19:57):
shouldn't be. And I want them to take courage and
take heart that at least the Alabama foot Soldiers laid
down a blueprint for you. They did it with no blueprint,
no blueprint whatsoever. When you realize what violence and acceptable
(20:18):
brutality they were up against back in those days, you
realize the heart it took not to hit back. And
this is somebody I'm just gonna get personal right now.
I'm a trained fighter, man, I'm you know what I mean, Like,
I've adjusted my body to combat, right. But here's one
of the things I had to acknowledge about the power
(20:40):
of non violence. Non violence. Non violence shows you who
the bad guy is. Non violence. By not hitting back,
you have established to moral high ground. And I'm talking
about I would feel more comfortable going in through a
position that they went in knowing that I could hit back,
rather than knowing that I couldn't. That takes guts, man,
(21:02):
I guess somebody who can do this, It takes guts,
And I applaud my elders, and I applaud the Allies.
I hope that people of European descent see the white
allies who took science because their lives were under threat too.
You know, one of the key enforcers of white supremacy
(21:24):
was that there was a covert message. And they're telling
white folks, don't you grow no conscience? Now, don't you
get to siding with them, don't be in love it.
Don't do nothing of that, because what we'll do is
show up at your door and you'll get the same
fate as they do. And they did, And so I
hope they see that no matter what it looks like now,
(21:46):
they ain't facing what they was facing back then. And
if there are similarities in the battles, take some of
these tactics, take some of his courage and keep on fighting,
because Donne they would if they were facing the opposition
that we face today. Wow. Um, obviously you paint a
very vivid picture. Um, and we're really excited about the
(22:10):
film's premiere. Um. So before we let you go, UM,
not only should uh do, I want to ask you to,
you know, plug the film, but I also want you
to plug that Ted talk and your social media and
and how folks can support you, you know, personally, anything
else that you got going. Let's make sure that folks
can happen. Alright, cool, Thank you very much. The film
(22:33):
is Can't Turn Us Around. Um, it's I believe, premiering
next Wednesday, seven pm Eastern. I honestly got to give
a shout out to History each channel because I've seen
them and I've been watching History Channel for for for
over a decade, man, and they're taking they're taking a
(22:54):
stand to tell it like it is like some somebody
up there under of stands the more responsibility. If I
look at the documentaries that they used to make about
presidents versus the ones they aired last year, there's a
lot more honesty and accuracy in those. There's a lot
more corporation, there's a lot more humanization of the black perspective,
(23:15):
and there's a lot more effort to be real about
decolonizing the narrative right. And and this is something I'm
not I'm just saying this because I've been watching for
so long, So I gotta give them props. And this
is a part of that first and foremost. Next, Um,
I am THEO. E. J. Wilson on Instagram. It's all
one word, no doubts, no underscores, THEO E. J. Wilson,
(23:38):
and um yeah, it's uh, this is gonna be a
powerful one because this is gonna be something that is
sadly all too relevant, which means it actually takes more
courage today to air something like this and they would
have even two or three years ago. Okay, um, and
then uh, just because I want people, Oh yeah yeah,
(24:02):
the black man on the cover. Oh yeah yeah, Okay,
So it's um, a black man goes undercover in the right,
And I think a good follow up to that is
another one I did called Requiem for Alonso. Okay, there's
another one called Requiem for Alonso that I did with
Ted xml High back in talking about my friend who
I lost to police brutality, which is I think a
(24:24):
lot more current. We did that during George George Floyd summer.
So those two A black Man Goes Undercover in the
all right and Requiem for Alonso excellent. Okay, Well, I
appreciate you sharing all that. Um, I know that uh
for our listeners are gonna tap in, but um, I
definitely I am excited to to check out this this film.
(24:46):
So again, I'd like to thank you very much for
coming on and sharing it inside today and of course
your commitment to h educating our people and all people
once again. Today's guest is the host of Can't Turn
Us Around alaba Us Foot Soldiers, also a community activisation,
of course, the grandson of the Tuskegee Airmen Extraordinaire UH, THEO. E. J. Wilson.
(25:10):
Thank you again, sir, Thank you, Ray appreciate it. I'm
Maggie b Nowen and today I'll leave you with this.
Can't Turn Us Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers premieres Wednesday, February
at seven pm Eastern Time on the History Channel and
streams the next day on the History Channel app. In
(25:31):
honor of June tenth. An extended version of the documentary
will be available to stream beginning Friday June on the
History Vault, the network subscription video service. Can't Turn Us
Around Alabama's Foot Soldiers is produced for the History Channel
and History Vault. For more information, please visit History dot
com Forward Slash Specials. This has been a production of
(25:52):
the Black Information Network. Today's show is produced by Chris Thompson.
If you have any thoughts you'd like to share use
the red microphone to back feature on the I Heart
Radio app. We'd love to hear from you. While you're there,
be sure to hit subscribe and download all of our episodes.
Find your daily podcast host at ramsays Shaw on all
social media. We look forward to your joining us tomorrow
(26:14):
as we share our news with our voice from our
perspective right here on the Black Information Network Daily Podcast
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