October 16, 2024 • 66 mins
In this episode, Prop sits down with investigative journalist and all around dope Black man Garrison Hayes. He's doin the work of helping us get our heads around how Black people in this day and age could support Donald Trump.
Follow Garrison: linktr.ee/garrisonh
Follow Hood Politics:
https://www.instagram.com/hoodpoliticspod/
Follow Prop:
https://www.instagram.com/prophiphop/
https://www.tiktok.com/@prophiphop
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
The media.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
There's been a thing that has like boggled my mind
for a long time, and I've been trying to figure
out how to approach this conversation.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
And it's.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Black people voting for trump hood politics. Y'all, Okay, listen,
But first, it's like this.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Bull look.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
It is like this.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Bull look is like this so look, it's like this.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Uh, like I wouldn't saw Conclave. It's actually it's clearly
a great movie. It's not what I thought it was
gonna be. Like I thought it was gonna be some
sort of souper defense of the Catholic Church and all
of it's inglorious glory and no, it was raw and gritty,
(01:11):
had a great turn at the end. It's pretty dope anyway. Uh,
starting with the fun stuff is TikTok, because I just
think this is hilarious. They had all kinds of a
emails and personal or intered company interactions turned into the courts,
(01:32):
but it was redacted, right, So a lot of the
things that are really damning about who they are was
supposed to be redacted. So your normal run of the
mill reporter who was just essentially looking at the redacted
document and then copy and pasting into their notes so
that they can, you know, do the reporting normal acceptable stuff.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
The problem was.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
The Redaction didn't keep redacting when it got copied over,
so it was all all the blacked out stuff was
not blacked out no more, and they could read all
the stuff that they ain't want nobody to know, and
which was we're absolutely trying to get y'all kids addicted.
We are doing things purposefully to get teenagers addicted. And
(02:21):
these little like time warnings about how long you've been
on the app is just cosmetic. This stuff don't work.
We're doing this because we're trying to give y'all kids crack.
And here's what's crazy. It's not like every other social
media ain't doing this. They just doing it better. They
(02:44):
just took it and made it Asian. They're just like,
we're just gonna do it better than y'all.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
Oh boy.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
They was like, y'all wasn't supposed to see that. They
was like, well, we wasn't trying to see it.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
It just showed.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
But since we looking at it, you are absolutely guilty
as charged. It is so funny to me that the
Redaction didn't keep redacting snitched on themselves.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Another News.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Final stretch of this wonderfully well balanced and not absolutely
psychotic presidential cycle final stretch, And one thing that does
(03:39):
bother me is Kamala trying to convince them that she
a safe negro. I'm like, stop trying to be safe.
But then again, I get it, because how you're gonna
get the job if you ain't a safe negro. That's
one of the Cash twenty two is about being black
in this country. You gotta show these people you safe.
But you know, we be trying to stay dangerous over here.
(04:00):
But that's because we're not running for office. If I
was running for office, I'd have to be sick. So
and what I mean by that is telling potential Republican
voters that you can possibly swipe off who just find
Trump untenable, that hey, look, look no, I'm one of
(04:22):
the good ones, you know, And I mean.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
Listen, understandable. The calculation is.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
The rest of us can't stand Trump so bad that
the idea of not voting and the idea of voting
for him is just impossible, you know. But they forgetting
about the people that's just gonna sit out. So anyway,
what do I know, I don't really run a campaign
never had. The Trump strategy is we gonna kill him.
(04:54):
There's thirteen thousand murderers living freely in America.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
We gotta get get him out.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
If the election doesn't go the way I think it is,
I'm sending the National Guard, the military because we have
enemies within, and we're gonna send the mill.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
He like we gonna kill.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Him, I'll bring in the militariat if y'all don't do
what I.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
Think y'all supposed to do. My man is just he
just y'all, that man is unhinged.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I just don't I don't see what you see in him,
which is gonna be a part of the rest of
us episode. Finally, blood on the streets and brains on
the sidewalk and body parts are Toddlers are just raining
(05:49):
from the ground as we speak. In northern Gaza. Yeah,
another school in a hospital exploded and somehow, I don't know.
I want to believe it's AI generated. I want to
believe it's so bad. But you see the hand of
a man who still has the IVY in his arm
(06:13):
being engulfed in flames as this hospital gets bombed by
the Israeli military. And here's what's crazy. Is that program
is the side quest. Now the main quest is Lebanon. Now,
Israel had just taken a bomb on one of their
(06:37):
military bases. Hear me, Lebanon struck one of the military bases,
and in return, America has sent a hundred troops to
Israel and has also added more of the sort of
(06:58):
iron dome thing the anti missile joints that they have
to help aid in the retaliation for the retaliation. All
the while, the UN peacekeepers are like, guys, help us,
help you.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Like it?
Speaker 4 (07:24):
You? You keep trying to say, this isn't a genocide.
It'saying an ethnic cleansing, except it kind of is it
kind of high key is guys?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
You I.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
I don't know how else to say this.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
He's what the.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
UN is saying right now. Anyway, let's listen to Garrison
like this, all.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
Right, we're back.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
It's not hard to note that, like, obviously black people
can be conservative, and there's a lot of them, a
lot of us as church folk, and some would argue that,
like when you look back at even just the attitude
of my father's generation and black panthers in them, their
attitude was like the generation before them civil rights movement people.
(08:35):
They was like, change the system, make the system equitable,
and thank God for them my daddy and them was like,
this system will never be for us.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
It will never ever ever work in our favor.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
And if that's your attitude, then you need to take
care of yourself. So a lot of the things about
you know, the black nationalists that I grew up under,
in a lot of ways dovetails to a lot of
those conservative views. Thee I don't want none of you.
I don't want the government's money because the government don't
love me. Government will never take care of me. They
will never have my best interest in mind. So we
need to make our own money. We need to build
(09:15):
our own schools, we need to build our own communities,
we need to do.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
All those things.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
So and again, church folk a lot of times be
hella anti gay, church folk be hella anti abortion to
a dovetail. So I understand the concept of a black conservative.
And what we find is a lot of them who
are conservative have rejected the Republican Party because they're like, well,
(09:39):
you're anti black, but still feel like they got to
play ball because that's the only way to get their
things done. We got the hommie Garrison Hayes, who turns
out like we kind of moved to a lot of
the same circles.
Speaker 4 (09:55):
It just got a dope.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
He did this video when he went to the RNC
and he reported on black Republicans and supporters of Trump,
and it was a no brainer. We had to bring
him down to other politics. So here it is me
and Garrison talking about.
Speaker 4 (10:17):
Caw niggas really love Trump.
Speaker 5 (10:20):
Here we go.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
Yeah, so we'll just jump in.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
First of all, Garrison, thank you so much for pulling
up on us prop.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
It's a real honor, man. I appreciate you.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
Yeah, this like we've been, you know, as the show
has kind of grown, you know, I think about like.
Speaker 4 (10:58):
The like, all right, could we really pull this off?
Like there's the kid, we really pull this off?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Like episodes and then how's the like how do I
handle this topic in the most respectful way possible? Like
that's what we was kind of thinking about, because like,
and first I want to commend you on that.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
Like, first of all, everybody, you've probably heard all.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
The intros that we've done already, but I want to
say first, after watching the piece you did with with
Mother Jones, I like work in the you know, peacemaking
kind of world on the humanitarian side. But before that,
it was like, you know, gang intervention, and like what
you have to do in those situations is like I can't.
(11:40):
You can't mock the people you're trying to bring to
the table, you know what I'm saying, Like, I can't.
You know, you can't talk down to them, You can't,
can't eye roll. You can't do that, even when stuff
that's coming out of their mouth is preposterous, you know.
Speaker 4 (11:52):
Like, but I can't. I have to keep you at
the table.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
And and while at the same time I suffer no foolishness,
you know. Like, So I first I want to commend
you on the way you carried yourself. I don't know
if that was magical editing or if you just that
much of a g Either way, I need to commend
you on how you handle yourself.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
No, I appreciate it. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
I'm I. I've been in conversation. So people may not
know this. I was a pastor for a number of years,
for about five years, and so between being a pastor
and a chaplain, and so I've talked to people in
some really intense moments where maybe I've preached about let's say,
justice from the pull from the you know, from the
pull picsion, and afterwards someone comes up to me and
(12:35):
they are upset because I said something or I didn't
say something, or whatever the case.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
You. Yeah, and so.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
You kind of learn one thing is I don't really
have the ability to stop my face from making certain expressions,
but you try to learn to be a little bit
more winsome and like give people space to say what
they want to say and ask clarifying questions where necessary.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
And so some of that is definitely coming out in
that video.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
From the pastoral side of it.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
Yeah, yeah, yea, and nah, I.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Respect that because I think too, Like you know, I
spent spent a good amount of time in like Christian
spaces and evangelical spaces, and once you start talking, like
really start talking to talk, you know what I'm saying
like that, you do have those moments where it's like, I,
I'm not going to get into a particular like I'm
not gonna get into like a theological.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
Debate with you.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
You know what I'm saying over some something that is
quite clearly biblical.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
So I'm not gonna you know what I mean, Like,
you know, I'm not like your your your issue is cultural.
It would take too it would take too long to
unpack this, you know, or like you said, like sometimes
it's like I'm I sometimes feel like especially because I
came from like a music and sort of entertaining side,
where it would be like you have a you have
a discipleship problem, you have an this is a this
(13:53):
is you have a local you have a home church problem.
Like I can't I can't help you with this, you
know what I mean. So yeah, so that's dope. It definitely,
it definitely shines through.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
So I appreciate it. I appreciate that.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
Yeah, yes, So it's it's a different it's a it's
a real different like intersection for I think.
Speaker 4 (14:13):
For specifically, like.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
I mean, it's my show, I could keep it a buck,
so specifically for like white evangelicals to understand the cross
section of like justice and progressivism that most of us
of color are like, I don't I don't see the problem.
I don't see what you don't see. I don't see
the discountcy So.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Anyway, yeah, I kind of want to talk to that
for a little bit because I do think that there
is something really interesting happening that I don't think we're
appropriately naming. It's this idea that being for racial justice,
like acknowledging that ever since the beginning of this country,
certain groups have been put down while certain groups have
been actively elevated, and and that often goes along the
(15:02):
lines of gender, sexuality, and race, and so like acknowledging
that is just kind of a fact of life in America,
fact of life perhaps in the world. Okay, fine, we
can kind of get on board with that. Now, the
second step is to say something must be done about this, right,
Like we have to kind of like fix some of
these things to make America the greatest place that it
(15:23):
can be. Now, yes, this is in many ways considered
being like progressive, like we want to move things forward.
But I challenge the assumption that pushing for racial justice
is like a progressive thing, right, Yeah, like believing that
black people should have the same kind of opportunities and access,
(15:46):
you know, like it shouldn't be segregated, it shouldn't be racialized,
Like communities that are poor should have opportunity to no
longer be poor, and the people who live there shouldn't
be blamed for the structures that keep them there, Like,
these are not actually like progressive ideals, right.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
It's incredibly bare minimum.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
It is quite literally the bare minimum.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
And what I appreciate that man, because I've said often
in the show, like I'm like, I mean, we're not
We're not Karl Marx over here by saying I'm saying
like it's not this isn't like a proletariat revolution. I'm
just saying, you know, this shouldn't cost that much. Yeah,
that's right, And there is laws that made this possible
(16:27):
that maybe we shouldn't have him laws.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
Right, exactly exactly.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
And I think what I'm trying to kind of get
to is that I am seeing a kind of like
person rise up, specifically in the black community, who is like, hey,
I actually hold conservative ideals. I heard hold conservative values,
perhaps around abortion, or perhaps around game marriage or whatever
(16:56):
the case may be. Like that is a common thing.
You black, I'm black. We've grown up in black communities
where we pretty normal. Yeah, it's like not abnormal for
black people to be relatively conservative. The problem is that
American conservatives, the Republican Party specifically, has made racial progress
an issue upon which they stand against Now. Now, this
(17:18):
is just like, on a baseline level, if I were
to give a critique of the Republican Party, it's that
you are missing out on an incredibly diverse number of
potential voters. If you're so stupid on race, I'm sorry,
I just have to say the thing, right, Like, can
I just be you?
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Right?
Speaker 2 (17:34):
No, bro, you spending, you spending homie, Like I can't
even get to my points of adventures because like you
already spitting I Like, for example, on the episode coming
out this week, on the episode coming out this week,
it was like.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
What we made.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
I made the point to where I feel like I
have to do the Republicans homework for them in that
if if you weren't so racist, like like, rather than
demonizing Springfield, Ohio.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
This could be your city on a hill.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
This could be your shining light city on a hill.
Like let me It's like again, let me do your
homework for you. You could say, hey, liberal legislature and democratic
laws pushed industry.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Away, right, so the city was dying.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
And then when the Republicans came in office, we brought
jobs back, so many jobs that there was such a
surplus and we got to fulfill the American dream by
bringing in legal immigration who also were willing to work.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
And now this.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Community is going together. You could even argue your community
is post racial. You could say that because you have
all these Haitian people working next to these white people
would not And there's eight thousand new jobs and families
are learning French and businesses are opening and rest I'm like, bro,
but like.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
I don't understand why you could have said that.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
But but instead niggas is eating cats, you know, Like
you know, I'm like I if you were so, this
could be your win. You could have said, listen, if
you just let us cook, you know what I'm saying.
If that's you could have said, if you just let
the Republicans cook, we can make all cities like this.
Eight thousand jobs, families are learning French, you're all learning
how to there's restaurants.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
It's great.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
We brought the city back to life.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
But no, I think that's why I think you're exactly right.
It's why former R and C chairman Michael Steele doesn't
feel like he has a home in the Republican Party today. Right,
this is an American conservative who just sees the leaning
in the doubling down on a kind of bigotry that
is actually inexcusable, and it you know, beyond the politics
(19:44):
of it being inexcusable and that it is a poor
electoral strategy, it is inexcusable on a moral level as well.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
The lives of.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
The Haitian immigrants, the legal Haitian immigrants who live in Springfield, Ohio,
their lives are measurably worse because the party, because one
of the two major parties, has decided to make them
a target of a very specific kind of narrative, a
very specific kind of campaign. In many ways, what I'd
argue is that they don't even really care about the
(20:12):
Haitians per se, right, Like this.
Speaker 3 (20:14):
Isn't at all.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
They are a tool that they're using that they're so disposable,
These Haitian legal Haitian immigrants are so disposable, and I'd argue,
in large part because of the color of their skin
and the origin of their birth, they are so disposable
that they're willing to just kind of use them, leverage
them to distract from the abysmal debate performance that Donald
Trump had a couple of weeks ago. The kind of
(20:38):
tanking polling numbers that he's had since Vice President Kamala
Harris has entered the race, the fact that he has
concepts of a plan but not a real plan. The
fact that his economic plans when they went when expressed,
are incredibly inflationary and would cause a global kind of
kind of collapse. Like, these facts are very bad or
for the Republican's presidential candidate. And so they come up
(20:59):
with the So now we're talking about Haitians on props podcasts,
and that's kind of the point, right, And the thing
I think I want to tie it to for the
community specifically is that it's because they see and it's
because of four hundred plus years of in culturation and
narrative building, they see these people as as disposable, as
(21:20):
kind of cast.
Speaker 3 (21:21):
Away, something that they can throw away and use in
that kind of larger plan.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
I'd even push that point even further and say, and
they also see the rest of the citizens of Springfield
as disposable.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
It's such a good point.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
I can lie about your city and they the city
has become a veteran ram and in the wake of
that have seen what thirty eight bomb threats, you know,
and like, and it's almost like bro, like keep your
name out of my mouth.
Speaker 4 (21:48):
Man out your mouth?
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Man, Like y'all not helping like I was with you, right,
but you just gonna drag us like this in public,
you know what I'm saying. Like, and then try to
say you doing this, You're like, don't you know it?
Almost don'ts on my back? Tell me it's raining dog
like you're not my friend, you know what I mean.
So that's like the that's the other ugly part about
that type of supremacy, that type of fascism that they
(22:09):
waiting in is like, well they don't they don't love you.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
Either, right, you know you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
So so yeah, man, we're like we are already there, man,
I love Yeah, yeah, no.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
That's perfect. No.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
So that that leads me to one of the questions
I had a little later that like, could you, while present,
did you notice what you kind of already laid out already,
like a distinction between a black conservative and a Trump person,
Like was there a distinction that you could see like
even with your own eyes.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
You know what I'm saying. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
So I actually had plenty of conversations. I've been reporting
on this for basically a year now and a lot
of the conversations I've been having with black people who
identify as conservative, they often reject the Republican Party. This
is kind of where I've come conclusion, and I think
we know intuitively, but my reporting has like really kind
of shown.
Speaker 3 (23:02):
That there there's a great there's a large group of
people who Black people, black voters, who again hold these
conservative kind of values, but see the Republican Party as
kind of an untenable, kind of unacceptable kind of case
for their particular political lot, and so that distinction is
often kind of drawn out in many ways. I do
(23:23):
think that kind of a value of you know, rugged individualism,
right like this, like I'm going to do it myself.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
I reject white handouts, I reject the quote welfare state.
I don't want any DEI like like that is a
value that I actually don't think is particularly foreign Again
within the black community, this idea that we've all been
raised with, this kind of saying this black axiom, which
is that sometimes most times, every time you got to
(23:53):
work twice as hard to get as much.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
That's the thing that we all grew up with.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
This is a kind of make sure you're doing your
part to push forward that I would see is in
large part kind of bas a particular kind of conservative idea.
I'd say this is small sea conservative, not Republican or
big you know, Heritage foundation foundation. But it is kind
of a kind of like individualistic value that we've all
(24:19):
been more or less raised with where I think it
goes off the rails if I were to kind of
do a little op ad here is there within that
saying there is a recognition that you do have to
work twice as hard. Now what is that twice as
heart referring to? It's referring to the structural barriers that
continue to keep black people and other people of colors
(24:40):
at the bottom of our American cast system. So there's
an acknowledgement. And what I found in conversations with many
of the black MAGA folks is that they just simply
do not want to acknowledge that there are these structural barriers.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
In the first.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
Logical jump, yeah, yeah, the logical jump is or what
that clearly the next logical step in the argument you're
making is what they said, why are you working twice
as hard? Like why you know what I'm saying, yea,
which brings me to yeah, man, brings me to two things.
One to echo your point, my father, My father was
a black panther.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
So there was in a lot of ways.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
The argument that you know, some make the same argument
that like before you would say like Clarence Thomas's brain
got completely cooked. It was like this was the attitude
to where it's like in my dad in a lot
of ways, even talking to him now, he's definitely not
as you know, he's much older now, but you know,
and he's definitely not as radical as he was. But
(25:40):
the idea was like this system is is designed to
destroy us. These people will never love us. So we
are all we got, you know. So even like he
we were out here in the La chapter the forty
fourth of Central like that was that was our area,
you know. And he was after school tutor, you know
(26:00):
what I'm saying. Like, so he was a part of
that pro and it was like and he goes, cause
I can't trust I can't trust the American education system
to teach my black son the things that he needs
to know.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
So we are going to do it.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
So and the same thing, it's like even though my grandmother,
you know, subsisted on assistant living. He was still was
very much like every dollar they give us is a
dollar we owe them, Like, you know what I'm saying, Like,
let's not you.
Speaker 4 (26:27):
Know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
And I think that like a younger version of that,
which I definitely wanted to ask you about, is like
the black capitalists, like the jay Z, the Killer Mike
version of like, oh well, we just need black banks,
we just need you know what I'm saying, Well, if
we owned our land, if we own these businesses, if
we own these things. I think in a lot of ways,
you know, part of me is like, yeah, you know,
(26:48):
you're in the ocean, you might as well swim.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
It's like it's a saltwater ocean.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
I have.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
The ocean is capitalism. I don't know what to tell you,
you know what I'm saying. But then there's the other
part of us that are like, no, the ocean is toxic,
and U's just like, is there an element of like
should we just burn the whole thing down? Or like
you said, like there's an understandable conclusion to say that,
(27:12):
like these radical views of the sixties dovetail into the
type of conservatism that you're talking about.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Yeah, yeah, Okay, so I do know what you're saying.
There's so many things that kind of trigger for me
throughout that whole thing. I'm working on something that's largely
built off of the book Locking Up Our Own by
James Forman Jr. It's a phenomenal book that I highly
recommend folks who are interested in this stuff get into.
It's really about black on black policing. It's about the
(27:41):
way that black people kind of govern at least their
own communities. I argue in this piece that's coming out
in a few weeks, so you guys are getting a
little early, I argue that black people love the police,
that black people are deeply invested in the police and
policing structures in a way that may feel a bit counterintuitive.
(28:02):
I give all of this kind of background, and I
promise I'm going somewhere with this in that, like what
you're talking about with your dad, my dad was also
a black panther, or at least in gay Black panther
party in Atlanta.
Speaker 3 (28:16):
So this was, you know, many years ago.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
But yeah, but one thing that comes out of this
this black this pro black black panther movement, is this
idea of being tough on crime so before Reagan gets
tough on crime, and and and beyond, before these folks
are mixed in, before they're engaged in tough on crime rhetoric,
the black community was actually deeply invested in back in
(28:38):
tough on crime rhetoric because they recognized that a crime
that the person who was pushing some drugs heroin for instance,
in their community, even if they know, even if we.
Speaker 3 (28:49):
Know it was like a psyop, and the government.
Speaker 1 (28:51):
Was engaged absolutely absolutely, the person who's actually doing the
distributing is a brother, right, And so they would put
up these signs. Black Panthers and other pro black movement people,
especially in DC, will put up these signs and say
want it brother for crimes against a brother, right. And
so there's this kind of like like whenever I hear
a conservative try to talk about black on black crime,
(29:11):
I'm like, you are sixty years too late. Like we've
been talking about black on black crime right for for
a very long time. I give all of that background
to say that the problem I find amongst many black
conservative thinkers, Thomas Soul comes to mind as a person
who kind of fits this description. They had an idea
(29:32):
in let's say the late sixties or the seventies about
how we move forward as a community, and they just
refused to take in the information and evolve. Let me
give a little example here, people, black people deeply, like,
really really deeply supported the nineteen ninety four crime bill.
(29:52):
We just passed the thirty year anniversary of the nineteen
ninety four crime bill, which accelerated mass and cars at
a rate that is actually unfathomable, did unfathomable damage to
the black community. Was architected by Joe Biden and signed
into law by Bill Clinton. Right, but over one hundred
(30:14):
black pastors across the country took out a full page
ad in the New York Times asking for Congress to
pass this bill. The Congressional Black Caucus supported the tough
on crime nineteen ninety.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
Four crime bill.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
They pushed for this country to do the thing that's
hurt us the most. Now, this is a this is
a tough pill to swallow, right, But but what we
can do here, What the Black Lives Matter movement, for example,
does is actually looks back over time and says, wait, wait, wait,
they may have intended this to be good. They may
have intended for this to save Grandma who was putting
(30:49):
up burglar bars her on her house, or to save
cousin who was getting engaged with like gang violence and
all this stuff. Right, Like, they may have intended it
to be a positive thing in our community, but what
we've loved learned is that it is a negative thing.
And what I often find is that the folks who
have been conservative for a long time or becoming conservative,
they refuse to look back at the way We've tried
(31:12):
so many things and those things have failed. So when
I hear you talking about and I'm finally landing, man,
finally landing. When I hear you talking, when I hear
you talking about black capitalism, I can recognize that black
capitalism has helped Jay Z become a billionaire, It's helped
many many others make a bunch of money. It has
(31:34):
not helped our community. It's helped individuals, but it's not
helped our community. And that is the value of capitalism.
Capitalism is inherently valued on the individual success, the individual
kind of you know, like ownership, right, And so I
don't want to getting you know, I don't have to
get bogged down. And whether or not we burn down
(31:56):
the system, I know, that's just kind of a saying.
I think many people have tried and have failed. What
I can recognize is that there are policy prescriptions, there
are ways to move forward that benefit the community. I
think about Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act, which wasn't explicitly
about black people. It wasn't on the it wasn't the
Black Care Act, and yet it lowered black uninsured rates
(32:21):
from I believe twenty five percent to like ten or
fifteen percent something like that.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
It lowered it, you know, significantly.
Speaker 1 (32:26):
That means more people who are now on health insurance,
who can now go to the doctor, who can now
get preventive care. I think about Joe Biden and Kamala
Harris's Prescription you know plan, where they lowered the cost
of prescription drugs, particularly around diabetes insulin, to like thirty
five dollars for seniors. That means that someone's grandmother or
(32:46):
aunt or uncle can now afford to get life saving medication.
Speaker 3 (32:52):
And while that may go against.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
The values of capitalism, which is like, if there's a
high demand, run the price up so that you get
as much as possible off of it, Right, that might
go against capitalism, I still think that those things are
valuable without ever having to necessarily destroy the foundations of
capitalism in this country. So that's how I tell you
about it, and I hope it's kind of a helpful
(33:14):
frame for the conversation.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
Yeah, no, it's perfect.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
It's perfect because you know, one of my mentors used
to say about like a couple of things you talked about,
like the there's like vertical equality and then there's horizontal equality.
So yeah, yeah, we've had a black president, you know. Yeah,
you were able to as an individual black person a
mass millions of dollars. Okay, yeah, vertical, you know, but
(33:39):
that does not mean horizontally there's this equality. And again
to your point, like you know, to amass the type
of wealth that these brothers are talking about requires a working.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
Class, you know.
Speaker 2 (33:55):
So it's like it's it's it's important. You can't get
there without exploiting the very brothers and sisters that you're
arguing or you're trying to undergirden support.
Speaker 3 (34:05):
No, I totally agree.
Speaker 5 (34:07):
I love it, man.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
So yeah, which actually leads me to the next thing
that like there were moments specifically in the video which
you kind of like in a in a in a
in a broader way I've already addressed when someone says something.
Speaker 3 (34:52):
That's like.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
It's just this is just not true, you know, where
like you know it, and there are certain things like okay,
you know, did was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
the start of World War One?
Speaker 4 (35:10):
Maybe or maybe.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
It was the situations that led you know, Priss to
feel like he needs to assassinate. Maybe it started twenty
years before, and then that's a matter of interpretation. Who
knows a white mob burnt down Tulsa, like that is
just what happened, you know herself saying like like I
(35:32):
just don't, I don't.
Speaker 4 (35:34):
There's this is not up for interpretation. This is just
what happened.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
And I find there's two questions I'm getting to here
is when discussing things like this that are just.
Speaker 3 (35:49):
False.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
I appreciated the way that you're like, no, we have
to stop this conversation because whatever point you're about to
make after this is invalid because it's built on an
axiom that is just false. You know, like where there
are certain things like I said that you can interpret.
You could say, what again, let me do your homework
for you. You could have said there were laws and
(36:17):
regulations that might have been removed that allowed for the
growth of Black Wall Street. You could have argued that,
you know what I'm saying, but to say the destruction
of it was this It's not a for interpretation, bro.
It was burnt down by a racist mob, right, so
you know what I'm saying, Like, I don't know what
to tell you, hoy, Like that's what happened. So I
think oftentimes when it comes to like you said, like
the maga folks that like just refuse to acknowledge the obvious,
(36:41):
like is there, I oftentimes feel like I'm waiting for
you to wink at me that like you don't really
you don't really believe this, like this this is a hustle, right,
like because again what you just said is categorically false,
like that's even in the white books, even in the
white school books.
Speaker 4 (37:00):
This is what happened, you know what I'm saying, So
like this, where did you get this?
Speaker 3 (37:05):
You know?
Speaker 2 (37:07):
But then there's like wait, maybe you do really you
really think this is and then so like what's your
read on the like? And obviously this is all like
anecdotal and speculation, but like, what is your read on
the like?
Speaker 3 (37:22):
The part of your soul you got.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
To turn into a pretzel and to deny reality to
where it's like you said, to lead up to the
point to be like like another moment in the thing
when you was like, wellhommie was like we believe the strong,
like the almost like a conservative doctor, Umar, you know
what I'm saying, where it's like, you know, the family,
the black family unit is the core of our civilization.
(37:43):
And we were better before the Civil rights movement, cause
at least we was together, my brother in Christ, like you,
there's nowhere in the world that you just said that
right now, you know what I'm saying. So, but about
the same time, I understand the logic that led to that.
Like my dad went to a segregated all black high school,
like and he saw black people at every point of
(38:05):
the social strata.
Speaker 4 (38:06):
I did not.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
I did not see that, you know what I'm saying. So,
like I would say, yeah, I never saw a black principle.
I didn't have I didn't know any black lawyers. I
didn't know any of that stuff because I just didn't
live in a segregated area. You feel me, so to
your point, yes, however, that was us making treasure out
of trash bro Like, no, that was in spite of
the laws, you know what I'm saying. So, like, I
(38:28):
just my question is like two questions. One, were there
moments during that time to where you were like, all right,
fam like this a hustle, right, And then so with
that when it's like no, maybe it's not a hustle,
what's your take on Like.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
How how you just ignore.
Speaker 4 (38:49):
History?
Speaker 2 (38:50):
I got to use to explain it, like you're just
just acting like what happened didn't happen.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
I think one of the things I learned going to
the RNC, I don't think it's a it's a sea
that I don't identify with the politics of the Republican
Party of course, but going.
Speaker 3 (39:05):
There I learned a lot.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
Man, I learned a lot and I got a lot
of empathy in the process. I gained a lot of
empathy being at the r and C this summer, and
for for starters, their media ecosystem is just totally different
from mine, right, Like I curate, So I tell people this,
I have a YouTube I have a YouTube like account
(39:28):
that's mine.
Speaker 3 (39:28):
That's just me.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
It's what I'm most interested in, and what I click
just makes sense for me, and then I have one
that I've specifically curated for right wing content so that
I can consume some of them, understand what they're what
they're thinking on that side. And what I learned being
there is that man like they they have a totally
different kind of set of facts instead of kind of
a different reality than that than the one I'm living in.
(39:51):
Right like, the news cycle is different, and the way
they're interpreting the news that might overlap is totally different.
And I think some of that seeps in in a
very genuine way into their understanding of history and economics
and policy and what's best for the community. I think
some of that stuff is really actually a part of
the whole thing. I made a video about Prager University.
(40:13):
Prager You has a series of videos on YouTube, and
they honestly misrepresent history Black history, specifically in ways that
I think is dangerous, and I call that out. But
I also have to recognize that someone's watching that and
they are getting the kids ready, or they're cooking dinner,
or they're just getting ready for their day, and they're
(40:35):
kind of uncritically absorbing this stuff, and it really is
shaping the way they view when they look back in
the past at history and so. On the one hand,
I want to give a bit of grace to say that, like,
people are busy and they got a lot stuff going
on in their lives, and so when someone tells you
that black people were better off before the Civil Rights
(40:56):
Act of nineteen sixty four, you may uncritically believe it.
Here to tell you that that's not true, right, Like,
like I'm here to say that black poverty has been
falling ever since black people started receiving civil rights protections.
This is a fact, right, Like, we've closed racial wealth
gap very very little, but it has been closed a
(41:17):
little bit post civil rights, and so that's important to
kind of like get out of the way. On the
other hand, there's an author. His name is Clay Caine.
I've been calling his name a lot because he wrote
a book called The Grift and it's about the downward
spiral of the Black Republican Party from the Party of
Party of Abraham Lincoln to the Party of Trump. And
in the he argues, and I don't fully agree with
(41:37):
his total argument, but I think the history elements of
what he's talking about is really strong. But he argues
that the modern black Republican is a grifter. They know
that if they say the right thing, they kind of
miss they represent themselves. They protect the white man as
best as possible from any criticism.
Speaker 3 (41:55):
Then there's a both.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
A pat on the head, a pat on the back,
and maybe a check on the other side of it.
I don't think that's true of your everyday voter. I
would never cast that kind of like aspersion on your
everyday voter.
Speaker 3 (42:08):
I don't think they have much to gain. They're just
saying what they really believe.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
But I do think that some of the media people
understand that if you say that America is in a
racist country, or if you you know, if you call out,
you know, black people, or say that the say that
Kamala Harris isn't black, or whatever the case, maybe if
you do that, if you go along with the Haitians
are eating cats and dogs thing, there is a reward
(42:32):
for you playing kind of you know, cover or for
this game.
Speaker 3 (42:37):
And and I and I don't.
Speaker 1 (42:39):
Have a lot of patience for it, but I have
been watching it very closely because I think it's a
it's a dangerous element within within our media ecosystem.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, perfect that's the like, that's the wink.
You know what I mean that I feel like, you know,
like black men and black men. I'm like, I'm like,
if anything, I'm like, just let me know that's what
you're doing, you know, because you don't feel me like
where I'm like, there's anyway you're That's that's a great point.
You also brought up earlier Thomas Swoll, which I'll be like, man,
(43:10):
that's day one, you know, that's that's.
Speaker 3 (43:12):
That's day one, you know. And and and.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
Honestly, it's like like you said, like any of us
could drive a truck through the logic that you know.
And I try to speak with the level of humility
in the sense that like this this person comes from
a different generation than either he's way more he's way
more educated than I am. Like let me just let
me just be real. You know what I'm saying, he's
objectively more educated than I am. I'm just saying, you
(43:35):
know that, like the world you're painting is not the
world we existent. It's just it's just not you know.
So yeah, yeah, I think too to your point about
like I have the same I have my like, Okay,
this is what I consume and this is what I
am consuming so that I can understand my neighbor, you
(43:57):
know what I'm saying, like.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
So, and but.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
Without coming off like which is again one of the
problems of like the left is like without coming off
as an elitist, like I'm trying not to be, but
just like There's been many times in either of these
spaces where I've been like, wait, hold up, what'd you
just say, Like I don't know about that chief, Like
I don't know if that's I don't know if that's what's.
Speaker 4 (44:18):
Happening right here.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
You you feel me like, you know, even to the
like to your point about policing and my my read
on on you know, black community capital C is we're
rather transactional and pragmatic, like you know, like we're like
you said, we're not We're not a progressive community. You
(44:40):
feel me like, we're not necessarily centrist as a political infrastructure,
you know what I'm saying, but just very transactional, like
who's gonna who's gonna help us?
Speaker 3 (44:49):
You know?
Speaker 2 (44:51):
And and this idea, like you said, of of the
grift being a part of like in some senses, feel
I'm be careful when I say this, but like feels
almost like within the tradition of being black in America
is like you have to find a hustle because like
(45:13):
we you and I have both acknowledged we are the
bottom of the cast system. They're like, you can't you
can't just play fair here, you know, because this is
just what it is. Now, do I agree with that
or not? Is that in the best interest not only
of yourself, like I would argue also, which is probably
the same argument you're making, which is like, not only
(45:34):
is this a detriment to your community, it's a detriment
to yourself because like you said, these white people don't
love you, you know what I'm saying, And they're gonna
keep pushing you further and further and further away, to
the point to where again you just become one of
the one of the Haitians eating cats.
Speaker 4 (45:48):
You will always be that until you are no use
for us, you know.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
So, so like not only not only you might be
going for that quick check, but like this is not good.
I'm telling you that right now, you know, so yeah, so,
like I agree, the average voter.
Speaker 3 (46:07):
Is like the.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Interview that you said is listening today, pastor like and
you know, at our churches, you know. Unfortunately, like you know,
we've been very historically very anti queer, you know what
I'm saying, We've been very anti abortion, and and so
that's what I mean, like to your point, like you know,
it's it's it's it's a very smaller group of us
(46:28):
that have like kind of pushed past these like sort
of convolution of like our faith stances and have like
pulled pulled the camera back a little bit and been like, oh,
this is a phyllish slaply project that like you're using
our views, you know what I'm saying, and speaking about us.
And I think one of the things that like really
(46:49):
evolved in my mind was when I realize, like, man,
y'all talking about this trans community the way you used
to talk about us, And that made me be like,
well hold up now, Like I don't again, my antenta
is like, well, I don't want to sound like y'all
(47:11):
the way you sound to me when I talk about damn.
That can't be the way we need to move right,
Like yeah, So my last thing, yeah, anyway, let me
let me.
Speaker 3 (47:24):
Get to this last point here was.
Speaker 2 (47:27):
When specifically in this in this in this video, when
you interviewed, you know, the pastor from Detroit, which I
think is the example of like the person that's like, bro,
these are just my values, and I feel like, transactionally speaking,
this is gonna get our values pushed forward, like I can.
Speaker 4 (47:47):
I could see him truly believing that.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
The thing that gave me pause was when he was like,
if a friend of mine called and said, I'm a
man coming in that has thirty six felonies, why would
I not let him come to my church? My first
thought was like, you're gonna let him preach, right right?
Like you know, I'm not asking you, like if you
let him come, you let him preach, like to me,
like you can't possibly not understand how that's different, Like
(48:18):
you no, you didn't just no, no, no, no, no, you
let him preach.
Speaker 3 (48:23):
To this point. Like I actually asked him that question.
Speaker 1 (48:26):
It didn't make it into the video because we had
to cut so much out of the video, but I
asked him that question, and I said exactly that, as
like you know, I would as a former pastor, I
of course come through, like come through.
Speaker 3 (48:40):
Yeah, you need to hear this, this life saving word.
Speaker 1 (48:42):
Yeah yeah, yeah, But I wouldn't give him the platform,
and he made the argument that you know, it wasn't
on a Sunday and that he didn't stand behind the pulpit,
but he did stand on stage, and the conversation was
before his congregation, right, And like, I think there's some
kind of you know, a little bit of like a
(49:04):
split in hairs kind of thing happening here that I
I feel like it's worth, you know, making sure his
perspective is out there, that he didn't feel like he
gave them the pulpit or let him stand before, you know.
But but looking at the video, he is on stage, right,
and like, so so there, I think it's a legitimate question.
And I would stand by kind of the framing that
you have that he kind of like basically let him
(49:25):
stand up there, you know, but he didn't give a
sermon per se.
Speaker 3 (49:28):
So I want to make sure we're being fair here.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
That said, I I am right there with you, man,
Like I think that that pastor has some value system
that has led him to the place where he's at, right,
But I do wonder about effectiveness, you know, Like there's
a there's a real question that I think many pastors
(49:52):
have to ask and answer, which is, like what is
my role in this moment, And I'm not totally sure
if like inviting someone so uniquely divisive and with the
history that that person has, and and then yeah, and
then if I can come back to this idea of
(50:12):
the thirty four convictions, I probably as Again I've said
this a few times as a former pastor, if the
person who is coming into my church or has been
invited to my church has sexual assault or has been
criminally liable for rate, if that person's being invited, I
actually have a few more questions before I say yes.
(50:34):
I actually have a few more questions. We need to
figure some out, figure out some boundaries. Who's who is
at risk in this moment? Am I putting someone who's
maybe sexually assaulted and this is a hypothetical sexually assault
to a child? Am I putting that person in a
position to have access to more children? I'd you know, like,
if is this a person who does not have control
over themselves and says that they'll grab people by it?
Speaker 3 (50:56):
I don't want to have to go down that road.
Speaker 1 (50:57):
But my point is like, there is a response ability
beyond the inviting everyone in, and not to make this
all about that particular pastor I had some questions though
about about the framing of that issue and whether or
not even values in mind, if this was the right
person to to to serve as a vehicle for those values.
Speaker 3 (51:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:18):
I mean, I'm like I have I have cousins. I
don't bring around my children, you.
Speaker 4 (51:23):
Know, like it or like blood related you know that.
Speaker 2 (51:26):
I'm like, I don't know, gee, like this is not
it's not wise. I love you, I'll meet with you,
you know what I'm saying, But like, am I going
to bring you around my family?
Speaker 3 (51:35):
Probably not? Probably not, probably not. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (51:41):
Sometimes you got to like this is just one of
those like realities of you know, living in the broken
system we live in. I think you you you you
hit the knit head on the nail to nail on
the head. That's what I'm saying about kind of actually
going back to like what do we mean by what
do you mean by felony?
Speaker 4 (52:01):
Like what do you mean by crime?
Speaker 3 (52:02):
You know?
Speaker 2 (52:03):
And I think that like this is where having a
real understanding of what policing and law and criminal justice
means in America could have because you know, crime is
crime is also racialized. Crime is also cultural, Like you know.
Is like if when it's a you know, when it's
(52:23):
a natural disaster in a white community, you're scavenging. If
it's in a black community, you're looting. You know, it's
the same thing. You know what I'm saying, We're doing
the same thing. I'm just surviving. So you said, I'm
this is the crime of looting. I'm like, I don't know, bro.
Like so he got convicted of looting during the Hurricane Katrina.
Speaker 4 (52:41):
Like, I don't know, bro, that was I don't know.
Speaker 3 (52:43):
If that was looting. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (52:44):
So, like, like you said, having those extra questions and
but again I GA think back to your to your
original point. It's it is because we have accepted the
reality that systemic racism exists.
Speaker 3 (53:00):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (53:00):
So since this is the reality when you walk in
with with the amount of felonies. I have a friend that
like was in the back of a car like that
one to high school with. He's sleep in the back
after basketball practice while his two friends pulled over and
broke this breaking and enery robbed a house.
Speaker 3 (53:17):
Wow, he's a felon.
Speaker 2 (53:19):
Yeah, I'm saying, but in the back of the car,
you just see what I'm saying, so I'm like those things,
those things require a little more interrogation.
Speaker 3 (53:28):
I think.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
I think I'll end with this one, which specifically speaks
to the black community and the black community that I
hope to talk to, I think in a lot of ways,
and and.
Speaker 4 (53:38):
And Latino community.
Speaker 3 (53:39):
I'm from.
Speaker 2 (53:39):
I'm from the East side of Los Angeles, you know. So,
like we do a lot of interaction with black and
brown issues out here, and that's been really a passion
not only for my life.
Speaker 4 (53:48):
But specifically for this podcast.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
And what I found was the the Trump thing for
at like the street level, they understand it, you know,
they understand him. It's like I can never be wrong.
I'm the boss. He get to the he get to
the money. You feel me, you know, you know, so
there's there's an understanding of how he moves, which to
(54:12):
which most of us should respond.
Speaker 4 (54:14):
Would then maybe he shouldn't be the.
Speaker 2 (54:16):
President if like, if he moved like Pooky in them,
then like maybe maybe this ain't our guy. You feel me,
but you have that being said, that sort of understanding
of like, well, this is something I'm familiar with and
(54:36):
makes sense to me. Then you fast forward to somebody
like a sexy Red that was like, well, I like
Trump because he got me the stemmis.
Speaker 3 (54:44):
You know.
Speaker 2 (54:46):
And again, I don't want to participate in the same
anti blackness that was happening with the generation before, with
the crime bills and such like that, and you know
what I'm saying, and just kind of sort of like
play the respectability politics, you know, and just these young
niggas is weird, you know what I'm saying, Like I
don't want to.
Speaker 4 (55:05):
Participate into in that.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
However, that way of thinking is so in a lot
of times for me, it's like it's a little heartbreaking
in the sense that I'm like, Okay, so he got
you fourteen hundred dollars for four years. That's not even
a that's not even one month's rent, right right, right?
Four years? Like is this really? That's really? That's really
(55:28):
all it took was just fourteen I don't even know
where my question is in this, but just uh, I
hear the question though, Yeah, Like how how do we engage?
Like I said at the beginning, it's like I need to,
I need to I need you at the table, like
so like I'm not going to speak in a way
that's like down to you and come up as a leaders.
(55:51):
That being said, I am we are clearly more informed,
you know what I'm saying, So like what are your
what are your thoughts on, like how do we keep
the young homies at the table, you know, and being
able to say, like one of the things that we've
talked about on our show was like real political power
versus like astroturfing, you know what I'm saying, where it's like,
(56:11):
I know, you know lo Homie Trey, Little City James,
Like if he shoots a text out like hey, we're
gonna meet on you know what I'm saying, We're gonna
be on on on Crenshawn'slaws, and you know I need
I need one hundred and fifty people.
Speaker 4 (56:27):
Three hundred people are coming.
Speaker 3 (56:28):
Off a text.
Speaker 4 (56:29):
I'm like, that's that's real political power.
Speaker 3 (56:32):
You can organize, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (56:35):
So because they're actually coming, you know what I'm saying,
So like the to me, it's like these are the
people that if I'm gonna if we're gonna onboard them
into like really imagining a black future, I need somebody
like this at the table. So my question is like, yeah,
if you could figure out the question and They're like,
how do we keep them engaged?
Speaker 3 (56:53):
No, I think that's in a conversation.
Speaker 1 (56:54):
Yeah, I think it's the right the right question, and
this is the right conversation for us to be having
right now because people are interested. It's more, it's so
important to have this conversation now because people are tuned in.
Speaker 3 (57:05):
It's even more important to have it in a year.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
It's even more important than two years, right, And so
I think for me, it starts with understanding that people
are rightfully cynical about what's happening right now. Right there's
a new study that came out about the Black vote,
National Black Voter Values, and it talks about this group
of people, this significant group of people about twenty percent
(57:29):
who are black voters potential Black voters, but are cynical.
And many of the folks in that kind of cohort
are black men. And I think it's actually really appropriate
for us to kind of like land here because we
talked earlier about the nineteen ninety four crime bill that
disproportionately criminalized black men us black men.
Speaker 3 (57:49):
You come to.
Speaker 1 (57:49):
Twenty twenty four, thirty years later, and black men. I've
talked to dozens, dozens of black men who are voting
age who are like, I'm not dealing with that, I'm
not engaged with Yes, I'm trying to get my money
and I'm gonna take care of my family and I'm
gonna be fine, and they gonna do what they're gonna
do anyway, Right, that cynical kind of that cynicism is warranted.
(58:10):
It is fat like it is so like like it
makes sense. I get it. You say it, I get it.
As a black man, I get it. You see it.
Sometimes it feels like you see everybody else moving forward,
rising up, getting it, going to college, getting opportunities, working
like these culdhy like work from home jobs. It feels
(58:31):
like everybody's doing that. But the black men in my
life are stuck working nine to five doing manual lookers
on the floor, throwing bags under planes, feel like they
can't get ahead. And so I feel like, to keep
folks engaged, you got to start there. I mean, this
is like the most basic kind of gospel principle. I
(58:51):
know this isn't a Christian thing, but like you know
what I'm saying, Yeah, it really feels that way, right.
It feels like, Yo, look at the way that folks
who are are really trying to push forward a positive message.
You have to meet people where they are, and you
have to engage with folks on their basic need level
before you get started talking all this stuff. I really
have a lot to say here, So please forgive me
(59:12):
if I go on, no, like, go off, go of,
I'm gonna say this, man. I was in Atlanta a
few weeks ago reporting for this thing I'm doing for NPR,
and one of the interesting things that kept coming up
against is that when I'm in southwest Atlanta, I'm talking
like Cascade Beach or Hills, Sylvan Hills.
Speaker 3 (59:28):
Yeah yeah, yeah, like the commune and you know, the hood.
Speaker 4 (59:31):
Yeah yeah, yeah, no, no, I know where we're at.
Speaker 3 (59:34):
Yeah, like that.
Speaker 1 (59:34):
That's where I'm at, and I grew up not far
from there. My mom went to Sylvia High School in
the eighties. And so my point is, like, when I'm
down there, this is a community that has been the
hood for as long as I've been living, my mom's
whole life, and it is that way today, boarded up homes,
very transient, mostly renters.
Speaker 3 (59:52):
Like, it's that kind of community.
Speaker 1 (59:53):
And when I'm talking to people and their material conditions
did not change under Clinton. Whenever body was talking about
we're in economic boom. They did not change under Bush.
They're in bad shape under Bush, they were in bad
shape under Obama, they were in bad shape under Trump,
they were in bad shape under Biden. And now folks
are knocking on their door to tell you, tell them, hey, man,
(01:00:14):
you really gotta vote for Kamala Harris otherwise your life
is going to be really hard.
Speaker 3 (01:00:19):
And they're like, my life has been hard. Yeah, help
helped me understand the difference. What's the difference?
Speaker 1 (01:00:25):
That's the good. You have to acknowledge that this is
the reality. Now, where do we go from here? Now
we've acknowledged that this is the reality for many Americas,
many black Americans.
Speaker 3 (01:00:34):
Where do we go from here?
Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
I like to look at the number of votes in
each precinct, in each district, and oftentimes, man, it's a
couple hundred votes. Like oftentimes you're electing whole city council
members off of three thousand votes. So if you got
a guy who can mobilize one hundred and fifty three
(01:00:57):
hundred people, yeah, next tell you that your your point
is well to, is well made. That is political power.
If you can get that person to mobilize three hundred
people for four or five days straight.
Speaker 3 (01:01:11):
You own it strong.
Speaker 1 (01:01:13):
But you basically have chosen that's the person who will
represent your district.
Speaker 3 (01:01:18):
You've chosen that person.
Speaker 1 (01:01:19):
Now you are now the power broker for your district
because you know you can always mobilize enough folks to
get a person elected or to get a person removed.
And that's real power. That's real power that I don't
think that we've been told that we can actually affect.
I'll give a quick example. I live on a road
that's mad fast. I've been lobbying my city council member
(01:01:40):
for the last few months to slow this road down.
We just got a little speed sign thing that just
flashes how fast you're going. It's a step, right, it's
a step. And the thing is, when I called her
and said, hey, my role is kind of fast like it.
Speaker 3 (01:01:57):
It bothers me.
Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
I'm sitting at home on a Sunday watching people drive
way too fast down my road.
Speaker 3 (01:02:02):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
She's like, well, you're the first person to call about this.
I'm the first person. It's like hundreds of people that
live on this road.
Speaker 2 (01:02:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:02:08):
Yeah, and I'm the first person to call. Your voice
is actually so much. When you call your council member,
when you call your center, when you call your representative,
when you go to the mayor's office and you show up,
you are probably one of twenty five people who've shown up,
and all twenty four of the other people are like
all white women, all white say because they know how
to work it. They go get where they will how
to and so like you can have. What I'm trying
(01:02:30):
to say is like the government is not complicated. They
want you to think it's complicated, because then you kind
of get a little like brain fog and you feel like.
Speaker 3 (01:02:37):
It's not really worth it. I'm just go do what
I gotta do. It's not complicated.
Speaker 1 (01:02:40):
Show up, pull your homies together to show up, pull
your community together to show up, talk to people, and.
Speaker 3 (01:02:48):
It'll work. And so that's that's what I say.
Speaker 1 (01:02:51):
First of all, acknowledge what's going on, acknowledge the factor
that folks are rightfully cynical. And then second, let's create
some pathways. Let's give some actual next step for how
to engage.
Speaker 2 (01:03:01):
Yeah, bro, this couldn't have been better. It's like you
even like I mean, the cornerstone premise of this show
is what you just said, is that government's not that complicated.
You understand this more than you think you do. Oh yeah,
you know, and in a lot of ways. Again, one
of our cornerstone premises is like you've actually been doing
(01:03:22):
politics your whole life, like you've already been doing it,
it's just by a different name. Garson, Thank you so
much for doing this with us. Man, Can you please
plug all your plugs of like where they could follow you,
where they could see your videos?
Speaker 3 (01:03:37):
All that for sure? For sure.
Speaker 1 (01:03:40):
First of all, probably is a real honor. I don't
say that lightly. It's amazing to be here. Long time
admirer of your work.
Speaker 3 (01:03:47):
Man, don't tell me that, bro, Thank you man, serious,
I'm serious.
Speaker 1 (01:03:51):
Yeah, And so I'll say you can follow me on
social media's I'm Garrison Hayes on everything, at Garrison h
on Instagram, at Garrison hat on TikTok, at Harrison Haes
on YouTube, and you can find the link to the
rest of my stuff from any of those places in
my podiot that's.
Speaker 4 (01:04:07):
What it is.
Speaker 2 (01:04:09):
Once again, thank you so much, and please lock in
with this brilliant brain right here doing amazing stuff down
there in the A.
Speaker 4 (01:04:16):
Appreciate you, all right, y'all appreciate you. I get stop
and we're good. Zoe though.
Speaker 2 (01:04:34):
All right, now, don't you hit stop on this pod.
You better listen to these credits. I need you to
finish this thing so I can get the download numbers. Okay,
so don't stop it yet, but listen. This was recorded
in East Lost boil Heights by your boy Propaganda. Tap
in with me at prop hip hop dot com. If
(01:04:55):
you're in the Coldbrew coffee we got Terraform Coldbrew. You
can go there dot com and use promo code hood
get twenty percent off get yourself some coffee. This was mixed, edited,
and mastered by your boy Matt Alsowski Killing the Beat Softly.
Check out his website Mattowsowski dot com.
Speaker 4 (01:05:13):
I'm a speller for you because I.
Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
Know M A T T O S O W s
ki dot com Matthowsowski dot com. He got more music
and stuff like that on there, so gonna check out
The heat Politics is a member of Cool Zone Media,
executive produced by Sophie Lichterman, part of the iHeartMedia podcast network.
(01:05:36):
Your theme music and scoring is also by the one
and nobly Matt Awsowski. Still killing the Beat Softly, so listen.
Don't let nobody lie to you. If you understand urban living,
you understand politics. These people is not smarter than you.
We'll see y'all next week.
Speaker 3 (01:06:00):
Addition one
The media.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
There's been a thing that has like boggled my mind
for a long time, and I've been trying to figure
out how to approach this conversation.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
And it's.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Black people voting for trump hood politics. Y'all, Okay, listen,
But first, it's like this.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Bull look.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
It is like this.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Bull look is like this so look, it's like this.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Uh, like I wouldn't saw Conclave. It's actually it's clearly
a great movie. It's not what I thought it was
gonna be. Like I thought it was gonna be some
sort of souper defense of the Catholic Church and all
of it's inglorious glory and no, it was raw and gritty,
(01:11):
had a great turn at the end. It's pretty dope anyway. Uh,
starting with the fun stuff is TikTok, because I just
think this is hilarious. They had all kinds of a
emails and personal or intered company interactions turned into the courts,
(01:32):
but it was redacted, right, So a lot of the
things that are really damning about who they are was
supposed to be redacted. So your normal run of the
mill reporter who was just essentially looking at the redacted
document and then copy and pasting into their notes so
that they can, you know, do the reporting normal acceptable stuff.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
The problem was.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
The Redaction didn't keep redacting when it got copied over,
so it was all all the blacked out stuff was
not blacked out no more, and they could read all
the stuff that they ain't want nobody to know, and
which was we're absolutely trying to get y'all kids addicted.
We are doing things purposefully to get teenagers addicted. And
(02:21):
these little like time warnings about how long you've been
on the app is just cosmetic. This stuff don't work.
We're doing this because we're trying to give y'all kids crack.
And here's what's crazy. It's not like every other social
media ain't doing this. They just doing it better. They
(02:44):
just took it and made it Asian. They're just like,
we're just gonna do it better than y'all.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
Oh boy.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
They was like, y'all wasn't supposed to see that. They
was like, well, we wasn't trying to see it.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
It just showed.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
But since we looking at it, you are absolutely guilty
as charged. It is so funny to me that the
Redaction didn't keep redacting snitched on themselves.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Another News.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Final stretch of this wonderfully well balanced and not absolutely
psychotic presidential cycle final stretch, And one thing that does
(03:39):
bother me is Kamala trying to convince them that she
a safe negro. I'm like, stop trying to be safe.
But then again, I get it, because how you're gonna
get the job if you ain't a safe negro. That's
one of the Cash twenty two is about being black
in this country. You gotta show these people you safe.
But you know, we be trying to stay dangerous over here.
(04:00):
But that's because we're not running for office. If I
was running for office, I'd have to be sick. So
and what I mean by that is telling potential Republican
voters that you can possibly swipe off who just find
Trump untenable, that hey, look, look no, I'm one of
(04:22):
the good ones, you know, And I mean.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
Listen, understandable. The calculation is.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
The rest of us can't stand Trump so bad that
the idea of not voting and the idea of voting
for him is just impossible, you know. But they forgetting
about the people that's just gonna sit out. So anyway,
what do I know, I don't really run a campaign
never had. The Trump strategy is we gonna kill him.
(04:54):
There's thirteen thousand murderers living freely in America.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
We gotta get get him out.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
If the election doesn't go the way I think it is,
I'm sending the National Guard, the military because we have
enemies within, and we're gonna send the mill.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
He like we gonna kill.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Him, I'll bring in the militariat if y'all don't do
what I.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
Think y'all supposed to do. My man is just he
just y'all, that man is unhinged.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I just don't I don't see what you see in him,
which is gonna be a part of the rest of
us episode. Finally, blood on the streets and brains on
the sidewalk and body parts are Toddlers are just raining
(05:49):
from the ground as we speak. In northern Gaza. Yeah,
another school in a hospital exploded and somehow, I don't know.
I want to believe it's AI generated. I want to
believe it's so bad. But you see the hand of
a man who still has the IVY in his arm
(06:13):
being engulfed in flames as this hospital gets bombed by
the Israeli military. And here's what's crazy. Is that program
is the side quest. Now the main quest is Lebanon. Now,
Israel had just taken a bomb on one of their
(06:37):
military bases. Hear me, Lebanon struck one of the military bases,
and in return, America has sent a hundred troops to
Israel and has also added more of the sort of
(06:58):
iron dome thing the anti missile joints that they have
to help aid in the retaliation for the retaliation. All
the while, the UN peacekeepers are like, guys, help us,
help you.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Like it?
Speaker 4 (07:24):
You? You keep trying to say, this isn't a genocide.
It'saying an ethnic cleansing, except it kind of is it
kind of high key is guys?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
You I.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
I don't know how else to say this.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
He's what the.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
UN is saying right now. Anyway, let's listen to Garrison
like this, all.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
Right, we're back.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
It's not hard to note that, like, obviously black people
can be conservative, and there's a lot of them, a
lot of us as church folk, and some would argue that,
like when you look back at even just the attitude
of my father's generation and black panthers in them, their
attitude was like the generation before them civil rights movement people.
(08:35):
They was like, change the system, make the system equitable,
and thank God for them my daddy and them was like,
this system will never be for us.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
It will never ever ever work in our favor.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
And if that's your attitude, then you need to take
care of yourself. So a lot of the things about
you know, the black nationalists that I grew up under,
in a lot of ways dovetails to a lot of
those conservative views. Thee I don't want none of you.
I don't want the government's money because the government don't
love me. Government will never take care of me. They
will never have my best interest in mind. So we
need to make our own money. We need to build
(09:15):
our own schools, we need to build our own communities,
we need to do.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
All those things.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
So and again, church folk a lot of times be
hella anti gay, church folk be hella anti abortion to
a dovetail. So I understand the concept of a black conservative.
And what we find is a lot of them who
are conservative have rejected the Republican Party because they're like, well,
(09:39):
you're anti black, but still feel like they got to
play ball because that's the only way to get their
things done. We got the hommie Garrison Hayes, who turns
out like we kind of moved to a lot of
the same circles.
Speaker 4 (09:55):
It just got a dope.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
He did this video when he went to the RNC
and he reported on black Republicans and supporters of Trump,
and it was a no brainer. We had to bring
him down to other politics. So here it is me
and Garrison talking about.
Speaker 4 (10:17):
Caw niggas really love Trump.
Speaker 5 (10:20):
Here we go.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
Yeah, so we'll just jump in.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
First of all, Garrison, thank you so much for pulling
up on us prop.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
It's a real honor, man. I appreciate you.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
Yeah, this like we've been, you know, as the show
has kind of grown, you know, I think about like.
Speaker 4 (10:58):
The like, all right, could we really pull this off?
Like there's the kid, we really pull this off?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Like episodes and then how's the like how do I
handle this topic in the most respectful way possible? Like
that's what we was kind of thinking about, because like,
and first I want to commend you on that.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
Like, first of all, everybody, you've probably heard all.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
The intros that we've done already, but I want to
say first, after watching the piece you did with with
Mother Jones, I like work in the you know, peacemaking
kind of world on the humanitarian side. But before that,
it was like, you know, gang intervention, and like what
you have to do in those situations is like I can't.
(11:40):
You can't mock the people you're trying to bring to
the table, you know what I'm saying, Like, I can't.
You know, you can't talk down to them, You can't,
can't eye roll. You can't do that, even when stuff
that's coming out of their mouth is preposterous, you know.
Speaker 4 (11:52):
Like, but I can't. I have to keep you at
the table.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
And and while at the same time I suffer no foolishness,
you know. Like, So I first I want to commend
you on the way you carried yourself. I don't know
if that was magical editing or if you just that
much of a g Either way, I need to commend
you on how you handle yourself.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
No, I appreciate it. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
I'm I. I've been in conversation. So people may not
know this. I was a pastor for a number of years,
for about five years, and so between being a pastor
and a chaplain, and so I've talked to people in
some really intense moments where maybe I've preached about let's say,
justice from the pull from the you know, from the
pull picsion, and afterwards someone comes up to me and
(12:35):
they are upset because I said something or I didn't
say something, or whatever the case.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
You. Yeah, and so.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
You kind of learn one thing is I don't really
have the ability to stop my face from making certain expressions,
but you try to learn to be a little bit
more winsome and like give people space to say what
they want to say and ask clarifying questions where necessary.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
And so some of that is definitely coming out in
that video.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
From the pastoral side of it.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
Yeah, yeah, yea, and nah, I.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Respect that because I think too, Like you know, I
spent spent a good amount of time in like Christian
spaces and evangelical spaces, and once you start talking, like
really start talking to talk, you know what I'm saying
like that, you do have those moments where it's like, I,
I'm not going to get into a particular like I'm
not gonna get into like a theological.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
Debate with you.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
You know what I'm saying over some something that is
quite clearly biblical.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
So I'm not gonna you know what I mean, Like,
you know, I'm not like your your your issue is cultural.
It would take too it would take too long to
unpack this, you know, or like you said, like sometimes
it's like I'm I sometimes feel like especially because I
came from like a music and sort of entertaining side,
where it would be like you have a you have
a discipleship problem, you have an this is a this
(13:53):
is you have a local you have a home church problem.
Like I can't I can't help you with this, you
know what I mean. So yeah, so that's dope. It definitely,
it definitely shines through.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
So I appreciate it. I appreciate that.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
Yeah, yes, So it's it's a different it's a it's
a real different like intersection for I think.
Speaker 4 (14:13):
For specifically, like.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
I mean, it's my show, I could keep it a buck,
so specifically for like white evangelicals to understand the cross
section of like justice and progressivism that most of us
of color are like, I don't I don't see the problem.
I don't see what you don't see. I don't see
the discountcy So.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Anyway, yeah, I kind of want to talk to that
for a little bit because I do think that there
is something really interesting happening that I don't think we're
appropriately naming. It's this idea that being for racial justice,
like acknowledging that ever since the beginning of this country,
certain groups have been put down while certain groups have
been actively elevated, and and that often goes along the
(15:02):
lines of gender, sexuality, and race, and so like acknowledging
that is just kind of a fact of life in America,
fact of life perhaps in the world. Okay, fine, we
can kind of get on board with that. Now, the
second step is to say something must be done about this, right,
Like we have to kind of like fix some of
these things to make America the greatest place that it
(15:23):
can be. Now, yes, this is in many ways considered
being like progressive, like we want to move things forward.
But I challenge the assumption that pushing for racial justice
is like a progressive thing, right, Yeah, like believing that
black people should have the same kind of opportunities and access,
(15:46):
you know, like it shouldn't be segregated, it shouldn't be racialized,
Like communities that are poor should have opportunity to no
longer be poor, and the people who live there shouldn't
be blamed for the structures that keep them there, Like,
these are not actually like progressive ideals, right.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
It's incredibly bare minimum.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
It is quite literally the bare minimum.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
And what I appreciate that man, because I've said often
in the show, like I'm like, I mean, we're not
We're not Karl Marx over here by saying I'm saying
like it's not this isn't like a proletariat revolution. I'm
just saying, you know, this shouldn't cost that much. Yeah,
that's right, And there is laws that made this possible
(16:27):
that maybe we shouldn't have him laws.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
Right, exactly exactly.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
And I think what I'm trying to kind of get
to is that I am seeing a kind of like
person rise up, specifically in the black community, who is like, hey,
I actually hold conservative ideals. I heard hold conservative values,
perhaps around abortion, or perhaps around game marriage or whatever
(16:56):
the case may be. Like that is a common thing.
You black, I'm black. We've grown up in black communities
where we pretty normal. Yeah, it's like not abnormal for
black people to be relatively conservative. The problem is that
American conservatives, the Republican Party specifically, has made racial progress
an issue upon which they stand against Now. Now, this
(17:18):
is just like, on a baseline level, if I were
to give a critique of the Republican Party, it's that
you are missing out on an incredibly diverse number of
potential voters. If you're so stupid on race, I'm sorry,
I just have to say the thing, right, Like, can
I just be you?
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Right?
Speaker 2 (17:34):
No, bro, you spending, you spending homie, Like I can't
even get to my points of adventures because like you
already spitting I Like, for example, on the episode coming
out this week, on the episode coming out this week,
it was like.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
What we made.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
I made the point to where I feel like I
have to do the Republicans homework for them in that
if if you weren't so racist, like like, rather than
demonizing Springfield, Ohio.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
This could be your city on a hill.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
This could be your shining light city on a hill.
Like let me It's like again, let me do your
homework for you. You could say, hey, liberal legislature and democratic
laws pushed industry.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Away, right, so the city was dying.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
And then when the Republicans came in office, we brought
jobs back, so many jobs that there was such a
surplus and we got to fulfill the American dream by
bringing in legal immigration who also were willing to work.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
And now this.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Community is going together. You could even argue your community
is post racial. You could say that because you have
all these Haitian people working next to these white people
would not And there's eight thousand new jobs and families
are learning French and businesses are opening and rest I'm like, bro,
but like.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
I don't understand why you could have said that.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
But but instead niggas is eating cats, you know, Like
you know, I'm like I if you were so, this
could be your win. You could have said, listen, if
you just let us cook, you know what I'm saying.
If that's you could have said, if you just let
the Republicans cook, we can make all cities like this.
Eight thousand jobs, families are learning French, you're all learning
how to there's restaurants.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
It's great.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
We brought the city back to life.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
But no, I think that's why I think you're exactly right.
It's why former R and C chairman Michael Steele doesn't
feel like he has a home in the Republican Party today. Right,
this is an American conservative who just sees the leaning
in the doubling down on a kind of bigotry that
is actually inexcusable, and it you know, beyond the politics
(19:44):
of it being inexcusable and that it is a poor
electoral strategy, it is inexcusable on a moral level as well.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
The lives of.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
The Haitian immigrants, the legal Haitian immigrants who live in Springfield, Ohio,
their lives are measurably worse because the party, because one
of the two major parties, has decided to make them
a target of a very specific kind of narrative, a
very specific kind of campaign. In many ways, what I'd
argue is that they don't even really care about the
(20:12):
Haitians per se, right, Like this.
Speaker 3 (20:14):
Isn't at all.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
They are a tool that they're using that they're so disposable,
These Haitian legal Haitian immigrants are so disposable, and I'd argue,
in large part because of the color of their skin
and the origin of their birth, they are so disposable
that they're willing to just kind of use them, leverage
them to distract from the abysmal debate performance that Donald
Trump had a couple of weeks ago. The kind of
(20:38):
tanking polling numbers that he's had since Vice President Kamala
Harris has entered the race, the fact that he has
concepts of a plan but not a real plan. The
fact that his economic plans when they went when expressed,
are incredibly inflationary and would cause a global kind of
kind of collapse. Like, these facts are very bad or
for the Republican's presidential candidate. And so they come up
(20:59):
with the So now we're talking about Haitians on props podcasts,
and that's kind of the point, right, And the thing
I think I want to tie it to for the
community specifically is that it's because they see and it's
because of four hundred plus years of in culturation and
narrative building, they see these people as as disposable, as
(21:20):
kind of cast.
Speaker 3 (21:21):
Away, something that they can throw away and use in
that kind of larger plan.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
I'd even push that point even further and say, and
they also see the rest of the citizens of Springfield
as disposable.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
It's such a good point.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
I can lie about your city and they the city
has become a veteran ram and in the wake of
that have seen what thirty eight bomb threats, you know,
and like, and it's almost like bro, like keep your
name out of my mouth.
Speaker 4 (21:48):
Man out your mouth?
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Man, Like y'all not helping like I was with you, right,
but you just gonna drag us like this in public,
you know what I'm saying. Like, and then try to
say you doing this, You're like, don't you know it?
Almost don'ts on my back? Tell me it's raining dog
like you're not my friend, you know what I mean.
So that's like the that's the other ugly part about
that type of supremacy, that type of fascism that they
(22:09):
waiting in is like, well they don't they don't love you.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
Either, right, you know you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
So so yeah, man, we're like we are already there, man,
I love Yeah, yeah, no.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
That's perfect. No.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
So that that leads me to one of the questions
I had a little later that like, could you, while present,
did you notice what you kind of already laid out already,
like a distinction between a black conservative and a Trump person,
Like was there a distinction that you could see like
even with your own eyes.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
You know what I'm saying. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
So I actually had plenty of conversations. I've been reporting
on this for basically a year now and a lot
of the conversations I've been having with black people who
identify as conservative, they often reject the Republican Party. This
is kind of where I've come conclusion, and I think
we know intuitively, but my reporting has like really kind
of shown.
Speaker 3 (23:02):
That there there's a great there's a large group of
people who Black people, black voters, who again hold these
conservative kind of values, but see the Republican Party as
kind of an untenable, kind of unacceptable kind of case
for their particular political lot, and so that distinction is
often kind of drawn out in many ways. I do
(23:23):
think that kind of a value of you know, rugged individualism,
right like this, like I'm going to do it myself.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
I reject white handouts, I reject the quote welfare state.
I don't want any DEI like like that is a
value that I actually don't think is particularly foreign Again
within the black community, this idea that we've all been
raised with, this kind of saying this black axiom, which
is that sometimes most times, every time you got to
(23:53):
work twice as hard to get as much.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
That's the thing that we all grew up with.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
This is a kind of make sure you're doing your
part to push forward that I would see is in
large part kind of bas a particular kind of conservative idea.
I'd say this is small sea conservative, not Republican or
big you know, Heritage foundation foundation. But it is kind
of a kind of like individualistic value that we've all
(24:19):
been more or less raised with where I think it
goes off the rails if I were to kind of
do a little op ad here is there within that
saying there is a recognition that you do have to
work twice as hard. Now what is that twice as
heart referring to? It's referring to the structural barriers that
continue to keep black people and other people of colors
(24:40):
at the bottom of our American cast system. So there's
an acknowledgement. And what I found in conversations with many
of the black MAGA folks is that they just simply
do not want to acknowledge that there are these structural barriers.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
In the first.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
Logical jump, yeah, yeah, the logical jump is or what
that clearly the next logical step in the argument you're
making is what they said, why are you working twice
as hard? Like why you know what I'm saying, yea,
which brings me to yeah, man, brings me to two things.
One to echo your point, my father, My father was
a black panther.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
So there was in a lot of ways.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
The argument that you know, some make the same argument
that like before you would say like Clarence Thomas's brain
got completely cooked. It was like this was the attitude
to where it's like in my dad in a lot
of ways, even talking to him now, he's definitely not
as you know, he's much older now, but you know,
and he's definitely not as radical as he was. But
(25:40):
the idea was like this system is is designed to
destroy us. These people will never love us. So we
are all we got, you know. So even like he
we were out here in the La chapter the forty
fourth of Central like that was that was our area,
you know. And he was after school tutor, you know
(26:00):
what I'm saying. Like, so he was a part of
that pro and it was like and he goes, cause
I can't trust I can't trust the American education system
to teach my black son the things that he needs
to know.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
So we are going to do it.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
So and the same thing, it's like even though my grandmother,
you know, subsisted on assistant living. He was still was
very much like every dollar they give us is a
dollar we owe them, Like, you know what I'm saying, Like,
let's not you.
Speaker 4 (26:27):
Know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
And I think that like a younger version of that,
which I definitely wanted to ask you about, is like
the black capitalists, like the jay Z, the Killer Mike
version of like, oh well, we just need black banks,
we just need you know what I'm saying, Well, if
we owned our land, if we own these businesses, if
we own these things. I think in a lot of ways,
you know, part of me is like, yeah, you know,
(26:48):
you're in the ocean, you might as well swim.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
It's like it's a saltwater ocean.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
I have.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
The ocean is capitalism. I don't know what to tell you,
you know what I'm saying. But then there's the other
part of us that are like, no, the ocean is toxic,
and U's just like, is there an element of like
should we just burn the whole thing down? Or like
you said, like there's an understandable conclusion to say that,
(27:12):
like these radical views of the sixties dovetail into the
type of conservatism that you're talking about.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Yeah, yeah, Okay, so I do know what you're saying.
There's so many things that kind of trigger for me
throughout that whole thing. I'm working on something that's largely
built off of the book Locking Up Our Own by
James Forman Jr. It's a phenomenal book that I highly
recommend folks who are interested in this stuff get into.
It's really about black on black policing. It's about the
(27:41):
way that black people kind of govern at least their
own communities. I argue in this piece that's coming out
in a few weeks, so you guys are getting a
little early, I argue that black people love the police,
that black people are deeply invested in the police and
policing structures in a way that may feel a bit counterintuitive.
(28:02):
I give all of this kind of background, and I
promise I'm going somewhere with this in that, like what
you're talking about with your dad, my dad was also
a black panther, or at least in gay Black panther
party in Atlanta.
Speaker 3 (28:16):
So this was, you know, many years ago.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
But yeah, but one thing that comes out of this
this black this pro black black panther movement, is this
idea of being tough on crime so before Reagan gets
tough on crime, and and and beyond, before these folks
are mixed in, before they're engaged in tough on crime rhetoric,
the black community was actually deeply invested in back in
(28:38):
tough on crime rhetoric because they recognized that a crime
that the person who was pushing some drugs heroin for instance,
in their community, even if they know, even if we.
Speaker 3 (28:49):
Know it was like a psyop, and the government.
Speaker 1 (28:51):
Was engaged absolutely absolutely, the person who's actually doing the
distributing is a brother, right, And so they would put
up these signs. Black Panthers and other pro black movement people,
especially in DC, will put up these signs and say
want it brother for crimes against a brother, right. And
so there's this kind of like like whenever I hear
a conservative try to talk about black on black crime,
(29:11):
I'm like, you are sixty years too late. Like we've
been talking about black on black crime right for for
a very long time. I give all of that background
to say that the problem I find amongst many black
conservative thinkers, Thomas Soul comes to mind as a person
who kind of fits this description. They had an idea
(29:32):
in let's say the late sixties or the seventies about
how we move forward as a community, and they just
refused to take in the information and evolve. Let me
give a little example here, people, black people deeply, like,
really really deeply supported the nineteen ninety four crime bill.
(29:52):
We just passed the thirty year anniversary of the nineteen
ninety four crime bill, which accelerated mass and cars at
a rate that is actually unfathomable, did unfathomable damage to
the black community. Was architected by Joe Biden and signed
into law by Bill Clinton. Right, but over one hundred
(30:14):
black pastors across the country took out a full page
ad in the New York Times asking for Congress to
pass this bill. The Congressional Black Caucus supported the tough
on crime nineteen ninety.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
Four crime bill.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
They pushed for this country to do the thing that's
hurt us the most. Now, this is a this is
a tough pill to swallow, right, But but what we
can do here, What the Black Lives Matter movement, for example,
does is actually looks back over time and says, wait, wait, wait,
they may have intended this to be good. They may
have intended for this to save Grandma who was putting
(30:49):
up burglar bars her on her house, or to save
cousin who was getting engaged with like gang violence and
all this stuff. Right, Like, they may have intended it
to be a positive thing in our community, but what
we've loved learned is that it is a negative thing.
And what I often find is that the folks who
have been conservative for a long time or becoming conservative,
they refuse to look back at the way We've tried
(31:12):
so many things and those things have failed. So when
I hear you talking about and I'm finally landing, man,
finally landing. When I hear you talking, when I hear
you talking about black capitalism, I can recognize that black
capitalism has helped Jay Z become a billionaire, It's helped
many many others make a bunch of money. It has
(31:34):
not helped our community. It's helped individuals, but it's not
helped our community. And that is the value of capitalism.
Capitalism is inherently valued on the individual success, the individual
kind of you know, like ownership, right, And so I
don't want to getting you know, I don't have to
get bogged down. And whether or not we burn down
(31:56):
the system, I know, that's just kind of a saying.
I think many people have tried and have failed. What
I can recognize is that there are policy prescriptions, there
are ways to move forward that benefit the community. I
think about Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act, which wasn't explicitly
about black people. It wasn't on the it wasn't the
Black Care Act, and yet it lowered black uninsured rates
(32:21):
from I believe twenty five percent to like ten or
fifteen percent something like that.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
It lowered it, you know, significantly.
Speaker 1 (32:26):
That means more people who are now on health insurance,
who can now go to the doctor, who can now
get preventive care. I think about Joe Biden and Kamala
Harris's Prescription you know plan, where they lowered the cost
of prescription drugs, particularly around diabetes insulin, to like thirty
five dollars for seniors. That means that someone's grandmother or
(32:46):
aunt or uncle can now afford to get life saving medication.
Speaker 3 (32:52):
And while that may go against.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
The values of capitalism, which is like, if there's a
high demand, run the price up so that you get
as much as possible off of it, Right, that might
go against capitalism, I still think that those things are
valuable without ever having to necessarily destroy the foundations of
capitalism in this country. So that's how I tell you
about it, and I hope it's kind of a helpful
(33:14):
frame for the conversation.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
Yeah, no, it's perfect.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
It's perfect because you know, one of my mentors used
to say about like a couple of things you talked about,
like the there's like vertical equality and then there's horizontal equality.
So yeah, yeah, we've had a black president, you know. Yeah,
you were able to as an individual black person a
mass millions of dollars. Okay, yeah, vertical, you know, but
(33:39):
that does not mean horizontally there's this equality. And again
to your point, like you know, to amass the type
of wealth that these brothers are talking about requires a working.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
Class, you know.
Speaker 2 (33:55):
So it's like it's it's it's important. You can't get
there without exploiting the very brothers and sisters that you're
arguing or you're trying to undergirden support.
Speaker 3 (34:05):
No, I totally agree.
Speaker 5 (34:07):
I love it, man.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
So yeah, which actually leads me to the next thing
that like there were moments specifically in the video which
you kind of like in a in a in a
in a broader way I've already addressed when someone says something.
Speaker 3 (34:52):
That's like.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
It's just this is just not true, you know, where
like you know it, and there are certain things like okay,
you know, did was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
the start of World War One?
Speaker 4 (35:10):
Maybe or maybe.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
It was the situations that led you know, Priss to
feel like he needs to assassinate. Maybe it started twenty
years before, and then that's a matter of interpretation. Who
knows a white mob burnt down Tulsa, like that is
just what happened, you know herself saying like like I
(35:32):
just don't, I don't.
Speaker 4 (35:34):
There's this is not up for interpretation. This is just
what happened.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
And I find there's two questions I'm getting to here
is when discussing things like this that are just.
Speaker 3 (35:49):
False.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
I appreciated the way that you're like, no, we have
to stop this conversation because whatever point you're about to
make after this is invalid because it's built on an
axiom that is just false. You know, like where there
are certain things like I said that you can interpret.
You could say, what again, let me do your homework
for you. You could have said there were laws and
(36:17):
regulations that might have been removed that allowed for the
growth of Black Wall Street. You could have argued that,
you know what I'm saying, but to say the destruction
of it was this It's not a for interpretation, bro.
It was burnt down by a racist mob, right, so
you know what I'm saying, Like, I don't know what
to tell you, hoy, Like that's what happened. So I
think oftentimes when it comes to like you said, like
the maga folks that like just refuse to acknowledge the obvious,
(36:41):
like is there, I oftentimes feel like I'm waiting for
you to wink at me that like you don't really
you don't really believe this, like this this is a hustle, right,
like because again what you just said is categorically false,
like that's even in the white books, even in the
white school books.
Speaker 4 (37:00):
This is what happened, you know what I'm saying, So
like this, where did you get this?
Speaker 3 (37:05):
You know?
Speaker 2 (37:07):
But then there's like wait, maybe you do really you
really think this is and then so like what's your
read on the like? And obviously this is all like
anecdotal and speculation, but like, what is your read on
the like?
Speaker 3 (37:22):
The part of your soul you got.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
To turn into a pretzel and to deny reality to
where it's like you said, to lead up to the
point to be like like another moment in the thing
when you was like, wellhommie was like we believe the strong,
like the almost like a conservative doctor, Umar, you know
what I'm saying, where it's like, you know, the family,
the black family unit is the core of our civilization.
(37:43):
And we were better before the Civil rights movement, cause
at least we was together, my brother in Christ, like you,
there's nowhere in the world that you just said that
right now, you know what I'm saying. So, but about
the same time, I understand the logic that led to that.
Like my dad went to a segregated all black high school,
like and he saw black people at every point of
(38:05):
the social strata.
Speaker 4 (38:06):
I did not.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
I did not see that, you know what I'm saying. So,
like I would say, yeah, I never saw a black principle.
I didn't have I didn't know any black lawyers. I
didn't know any of that stuff because I just didn't
live in a segregated area. You feel me, so to
your point, yes, however, that was us making treasure out
of trash bro Like, no, that was in spite of
the laws, you know what I'm saying. So, like, I
(38:28):
just my question is like two questions. One, were there
moments during that time to where you were like, all right,
fam like this a hustle, right, And then so with
that when it's like no, maybe it's not a hustle,
what's your take on Like.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
How how you just ignore.
Speaker 4 (38:49):
History?
Speaker 2 (38:50):
I got to use to explain it, like you're just
just acting like what happened didn't happen.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
I think one of the things I learned going to
the RNC, I don't think it's a it's a sea
that I don't identify with the politics of the Republican
Party of course, but going.
Speaker 3 (39:05):
There I learned a lot.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
Man, I learned a lot and I got a lot
of empathy in the process. I gained a lot of
empathy being at the r and C this summer, and
for for starters, their media ecosystem is just totally different
from mine, right, Like I curate, So I tell people this,
I have a YouTube I have a YouTube like account
(39:28):
that's mine.
Speaker 3 (39:28):
That's just me.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
It's what I'm most interested in, and what I click
just makes sense for me, and then I have one
that I've specifically curated for right wing content so that
I can consume some of them, understand what they're what
they're thinking on that side. And what I learned being
there is that man like they they have a totally
different kind of set of facts instead of kind of
a different reality than that than the one I'm living in.
(39:51):
Right like, the news cycle is different, and the way
they're interpreting the news that might overlap is totally different.
And I think some of that seeps in in a
very genuine way into their understanding of history and economics
and policy and what's best for the community. I think
some of that stuff is really actually a part of
the whole thing. I made a video about Prager University.
(40:13):
Prager You has a series of videos on YouTube, and
they honestly misrepresent history Black history, specifically in ways that
I think is dangerous, and I call that out. But
I also have to recognize that someone's watching that and
they are getting the kids ready, or they're cooking dinner,
or they're just getting ready for their day, and they're
(40:35):
kind of uncritically absorbing this stuff, and it really is
shaping the way they view when they look back in
the past at history and so. On the one hand,
I want to give a bit of grace to say that, like,
people are busy and they got a lot stuff going
on in their lives, and so when someone tells you
that black people were better off before the Civil Rights
(40:56):
Act of nineteen sixty four, you may uncritically believe it.
Here to tell you that that's not true, right, Like,
like I'm here to say that black poverty has been
falling ever since black people started receiving civil rights protections.
This is a fact, right, Like, we've closed racial wealth
gap very very little, but it has been closed a
(41:17):
little bit post civil rights, and so that's important to
kind of like get out of the way. On the
other hand, there's an author. His name is Clay Caine.
I've been calling his name a lot because he wrote
a book called The Grift and it's about the downward
spiral of the Black Republican Party from the Party of
Party of Abraham Lincoln to the Party of Trump. And
in the he argues, and I don't fully agree with
(41:37):
his total argument, but I think the history elements of
what he's talking about is really strong. But he argues
that the modern black Republican is a grifter. They know
that if they say the right thing, they kind of
miss they represent themselves. They protect the white man as
best as possible from any criticism.
Speaker 3 (41:55):
Then there's a both.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
A pat on the head, a pat on the back,
and maybe a check on the other side of it.
I don't think that's true of your everyday voter. I
would never cast that kind of like aspersion on your
everyday voter.
Speaker 3 (42:08):
I don't think they have much to gain. They're just
saying what they really believe.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
But I do think that some of the media people
understand that if you say that America is in a
racist country, or if you you know, if you call out,
you know, black people, or say that the say that
Kamala Harris isn't black, or whatever the case, maybe if
you do that, if you go along with the Haitians
are eating cats and dogs thing, there is a reward
(42:32):
for you playing kind of you know, cover or for
this game.
Speaker 3 (42:37):
And and I and I don't.
Speaker 1 (42:39):
Have a lot of patience for it, but I have
been watching it very closely because I think it's a
it's a dangerous element within within our media ecosystem.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, perfect that's the like, that's the wink.
You know what I mean that I feel like, you know,
like black men and black men. I'm like, I'm like,
if anything, I'm like, just let me know that's what
you're doing, you know, because you don't feel me like
where I'm like, there's anyway you're That's that's a great point.
You also brought up earlier Thomas Swoll, which I'll be like, man,
(43:10):
that's day one, you know, that's that's.
Speaker 3 (43:12):
That's day one, you know. And and and.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
Honestly, it's like like you said, like any of us
could drive a truck through the logic that you know.
And I try to speak with the level of humility
in the sense that like this this person comes from
a different generation than either he's way more he's way
more educated than I am. Like let me just let
me just be real. You know what I'm saying, he's
objectively more educated than I am. I'm just saying, you
(43:35):
know that, like the world you're painting is not the
world we existent. It's just it's just not you know.
So yeah, yeah, I think too to your point about
like I have the same I have my like, Okay,
this is what I consume and this is what I
am consuming so that I can understand my neighbor, you
(43:57):
know what I'm saying, like.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
So, and but.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
Without coming off like which is again one of the
problems of like the left is like without coming off
as an elitist, like I'm trying not to be, but
just like There's been many times in either of these
spaces where I've been like, wait, hold up, what'd you
just say, Like I don't know about that chief, Like
I don't know if that's I don't know if that's what's.
Speaker 4 (44:18):
Happening right here.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
You you feel me like, you know, even to the
like to your point about policing and my my read
on on you know, black community capital C is we're
rather transactional and pragmatic, like you know, like we're like
you said, we're not We're not a progressive community. You
(44:40):
feel me like, we're not necessarily centrist as a political infrastructure,
you know what I'm saying, but just very transactional, like
who's gonna who's gonna help us?
Speaker 3 (44:49):
You know?
Speaker 2 (44:51):
And and this idea, like you said, of of the
grift being a part of like in some senses, feel
I'm be careful when I say this, but like feels
almost like within the tradition of being black in America
is like you have to find a hustle because like
(45:13):
we you and I have both acknowledged we are the
bottom of the cast system. They're like, you can't you
can't just play fair here, you know, because this is
just what it is. Now, do I agree with that
or not? Is that in the best interest not only
of yourself, like I would argue also, which is probably
the same argument you're making, which is like, not only
(45:34):
is this a detriment to your community, it's a detriment
to yourself because like you said, these white people don't
love you, you know what I'm saying, And they're gonna
keep pushing you further and further and further away, to
the point to where again you just become one of
the one of the Haitians eating cats.
Speaker 4 (45:48):
You will always be that until you are no use
for us, you know.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
So, so like not only not only you might be
going for that quick check, but like this is not good.
I'm telling you that right now, you know, so yeah, so,
like I agree, the average voter.
Speaker 3 (46:07):
Is like the.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Interview that you said is listening today, pastor like and
you know, at our churches, you know. Unfortunately, like you know,
we've been very historically very anti queer, you know what
I'm saying, We've been very anti abortion, and and so
that's what I mean, like to your point, like you know,
it's it's it's it's a very smaller group of us
(46:28):
that have like kind of pushed past these like sort
of convolution of like our faith stances and have like
pulled pulled the camera back a little bit and been like, oh,
this is a phyllish slaply project that like you're using
our views, you know what I'm saying, and speaking about us.
And I think one of the things that like really
(46:49):
evolved in my mind was when I realize, like, man,
y'all talking about this trans community the way you used
to talk about us, And that made me be like,
well hold up now, Like I don't again, my antenta
is like, well, I don't want to sound like y'all
(47:11):
the way you sound to me when I talk about damn.
That can't be the way we need to move right,
Like yeah, So my last thing, yeah, anyway, let me
let me.
Speaker 3 (47:24):
Get to this last point here was.
Speaker 2 (47:27):
When specifically in this in this in this video, when
you interviewed, you know, the pastor from Detroit, which I
think is the example of like the person that's like, bro,
these are just my values, and I feel like, transactionally speaking,
this is gonna get our values pushed forward, like I can.
Speaker 4 (47:47):
I could see him truly believing that.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
The thing that gave me pause was when he was like,
if a friend of mine called and said, I'm a
man coming in that has thirty six felonies, why would
I not let him come to my church? My first
thought was like, you're gonna let him preach, right right?
Like you know, I'm not asking you, like if you
let him come, you let him preach, like to me,
like you can't possibly not understand how that's different, Like
(48:18):
you no, you didn't just no, no, no, no, no, you
let him preach.
Speaker 3 (48:23):
To this point. Like I actually asked him that question.
Speaker 1 (48:26):
It didn't make it into the video because we had
to cut so much out of the video, but I
asked him that question, and I said exactly that, as
like you know, I would as a former pastor, I
of course come through, like come through.
Speaker 3 (48:40):
Yeah, you need to hear this, this life saving word.
Speaker 1 (48:42):
Yeah yeah, yeah, But I wouldn't give him the platform,
and he made the argument that you know, it wasn't
on a Sunday and that he didn't stand behind the pulpit,
but he did stand on stage, and the conversation was
before his congregation, right, And like, I think there's some
kind of you know, a little bit of like a
(49:04):
split in hairs kind of thing happening here that I
I feel like it's worth, you know, making sure his
perspective is out there, that he didn't feel like he
gave them the pulpit or let him stand before, you know.
But but looking at the video, he is on stage, right,
and like, so so there, I think it's a legitimate question.
And I would stand by kind of the framing that
you have that he kind of like basically let him
(49:25):
stand up there, you know, but he didn't give a
sermon per se.
Speaker 3 (49:28):
So I want to make sure we're being fair here.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
That said, I I am right there with you, man,
Like I think that that pastor has some value system
that has led him to the place where he's at, right,
But I do wonder about effectiveness, you know, Like there's
a there's a real question that I think many pastors
(49:52):
have to ask and answer, which is, like what is
my role in this moment, And I'm not totally sure
if like inviting someone so uniquely divisive and with the
history that that person has, and and then yeah, and
then if I can come back to this idea of
(50:12):
the thirty four convictions, I probably as Again I've said
this a few times as a former pastor, if the
person who is coming into my church or has been
invited to my church has sexual assault or has been
criminally liable for rate, if that person's being invited, I
actually have a few more questions before I say yes.
(50:34):
I actually have a few more questions. We need to
figure some out, figure out some boundaries. Who's who is
at risk in this moment? Am I putting someone who's
maybe sexually assaulted and this is a hypothetical sexually assault
to a child? Am I putting that person in a
position to have access to more children? I'd you know, like,
if is this a person who does not have control
over themselves and says that they'll grab people by it?
Speaker 3 (50:56):
I don't want to have to go down that road.
Speaker 1 (50:57):
But my point is like, there is a response ability
beyond the inviting everyone in, and not to make this
all about that particular pastor I had some questions though
about about the framing of that issue and whether or
not even values in mind, if this was the right
person to to to serve as a vehicle for those values.
Speaker 3 (51:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:18):
I mean, I'm like I have I have cousins. I
don't bring around my children, you.
Speaker 4 (51:23):
Know, like it or like blood related you know that.
Speaker 2 (51:26):
I'm like, I don't know, gee, like this is not
it's not wise. I love you, I'll meet with you,
you know what I'm saying, But like, am I going
to bring you around my family?
Speaker 3 (51:35):
Probably not? Probably not, probably not. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (51:41):
Sometimes you got to like this is just one of
those like realities of you know, living in the broken
system we live in. I think you you you you
hit the knit head on the nail to nail on
the head. That's what I'm saying about kind of actually
going back to like what do we mean by what
do you mean by felony?
Speaker 4 (52:01):
Like what do you mean by crime?
Speaker 3 (52:02):
You know?
Speaker 2 (52:03):
And I think that like this is where having a
real understanding of what policing and law and criminal justice
means in America could have because you know, crime is
crime is also racialized. Crime is also cultural, Like you know.
Is like if when it's a you know, when it's
(52:23):
a natural disaster in a white community, you're scavenging. If
it's in a black community, you're looting. You know, it's
the same thing. You know what I'm saying, We're doing
the same thing. I'm just surviving. So you said, I'm
this is the crime of looting. I'm like, I don't know, bro.
Like so he got convicted of looting during the Hurricane Katrina.
Speaker 4 (52:41):
Like, I don't know, bro, that was I don't know.
Speaker 3 (52:43):
If that was looting. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (52:44):
So, like, like you said, having those extra questions and
but again I GA think back to your to your
original point. It's it is because we have accepted the
reality that systemic racism exists.
Speaker 3 (53:00):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (53:00):
So since this is the reality when you walk in
with with the amount of felonies. I have a friend that
like was in the back of a car like that
one to high school with. He's sleep in the back
after basketball practice while his two friends pulled over and
broke this breaking and enery robbed a house.
Speaker 3 (53:17):
Wow, he's a felon.
Speaker 2 (53:19):
Yeah, I'm saying, but in the back of the car,
you just see what I'm saying, so I'm like those things,
those things require a little more interrogation.
Speaker 3 (53:28):
I think.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
I think I'll end with this one, which specifically speaks
to the black community and the black community that I
hope to talk to, I think in a lot of ways,
and and.
Speaker 4 (53:38):
And Latino community.
Speaker 3 (53:39):
I'm from.
Speaker 2 (53:39):
I'm from the East side of Los Angeles, you know. So,
like we do a lot of interaction with black and
brown issues out here, and that's been really a passion
not only for my life.
Speaker 4 (53:48):
But specifically for this podcast.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
And what I found was the the Trump thing for
at like the street level, they understand it, you know,
they understand him. It's like I can never be wrong.
I'm the boss. He get to the he get to
the money. You feel me, you know, you know, so
there's there's an understanding of how he moves, which to
(54:12):
which most of us should respond.
Speaker 4 (54:14):
Would then maybe he shouldn't be the.
Speaker 2 (54:16):
President if like, if he moved like Pooky in them,
then like maybe maybe this ain't our guy. You feel me,
but you have that being said, that sort of understanding
of like, well, this is something I'm familiar with and
(54:36):
makes sense to me. Then you fast forward to somebody
like a sexy Red that was like, well, I like
Trump because he got me the stemmis.
Speaker 3 (54:44):
You know.
Speaker 2 (54:46):
And again, I don't want to participate in the same
anti blackness that was happening with the generation before, with
the crime bills and such like that, and you know
what I'm saying, and just kind of sort of like
play the respectability politics, you know, and just these young
niggas is weird, you know what I'm saying, Like I
don't want to.
Speaker 4 (55:05):
Participate into in that.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
However, that way of thinking is so in a lot
of times for me, it's like it's a little heartbreaking
in the sense that I'm like, Okay, so he got
you fourteen hundred dollars for four years. That's not even
a that's not even one month's rent, right right, right?
Four years? Like is this really? That's really? That's really
(55:28):
all it took was just fourteen I don't even know
where my question is in this, but just uh, I
hear the question though, Yeah, Like how how do we engage?
Like I said at the beginning, it's like I need to,
I need to I need you at the table, like
so like I'm not going to speak in a way
that's like down to you and come up as a leaders.
(55:51):
That being said, I am we are clearly more informed,
you know what I'm saying, So like what are your
what are your thoughts on, like how do we keep
the young homies at the table, you know, and being
able to say, like one of the things that we've
talked about on our show was like real political power
versus like astroturfing, you know what I'm saying, where it's like,
(56:11):
I know, you know lo Homie Trey, Little City James,
Like if he shoots a text out like hey, we're
gonna meet on you know what I'm saying, We're gonna
be on on on Crenshawn'slaws, and you know I need
I need one hundred and fifty people.
Speaker 4 (56:27):
Three hundred people are coming.
Speaker 3 (56:28):
Off a text.
Speaker 4 (56:29):
I'm like, that's that's real political power.
Speaker 3 (56:32):
You can organize, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (56:35):
So because they're actually coming, you know what I'm saying,
So like the to me, it's like these are the
people that if I'm gonna if we're gonna onboard them
into like really imagining a black future, I need somebody
like this at the table. So my question is like, yeah,
if you could figure out the question and They're like,
how do we keep them engaged?
Speaker 3 (56:53):
No, I think that's in a conversation.
Speaker 1 (56:54):
Yeah, I think it's the right the right question, and
this is the right conversation for us to be having
right now because people are interested. It's more, it's so
important to have this conversation now because people are tuned in.
Speaker 3 (57:05):
It's even more important to have it in a year.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
It's even more important than two years, right, And so
I think for me, it starts with understanding that people
are rightfully cynical about what's happening right now. Right there's
a new study that came out about the Black vote,
National Black Voter Values, and it talks about this group
of people, this significant group of people about twenty percent
(57:29):
who are black voters potential Black voters, but are cynical.
And many of the folks in that kind of cohort
are black men. And I think it's actually really appropriate
for us to kind of like land here because we
talked earlier about the nineteen ninety four crime bill that
disproportionately criminalized black men us black men.
Speaker 3 (57:49):
You come to.
Speaker 1 (57:49):
Twenty twenty four, thirty years later, and black men. I've
talked to dozens, dozens of black men who are voting
age who are like, I'm not dealing with that, I'm
not engaged with Yes, I'm trying to get my money
and I'm gonna take care of my family and I'm
gonna be fine, and they gonna do what they're gonna
do anyway, Right, that cynical kind of that cynicism is warranted.
(58:10):
It is fat like it is so like like it
makes sense. I get it. You say it, I get it.
As a black man, I get it. You see it.
Sometimes it feels like you see everybody else moving forward,
rising up, getting it, going to college, getting opportunities, working
like these culdhy like work from home jobs. It feels
(58:31):
like everybody's doing that. But the black men in my
life are stuck working nine to five doing manual lookers
on the floor, throwing bags under planes, feel like they
can't get ahead. And so I feel like, to keep
folks engaged, you got to start there. I mean, this
is like the most basic kind of gospel principle. I
(58:51):
know this isn't a Christian thing, but like you know
what I'm saying, Yeah, it really feels that way, right.
It feels like, Yo, look at the way that folks
who are are really trying to push forward a positive message.
You have to meet people where they are, and you
have to engage with folks on their basic need level
before you get started talking all this stuff. I really
have a lot to say here, So please forgive me
(59:12):
if I go on, no, like, go off, go of,
I'm gonna say this, man. I was in Atlanta a
few weeks ago reporting for this thing I'm doing for NPR,
and one of the interesting things that kept coming up
against is that when I'm in southwest Atlanta, I'm talking
like Cascade Beach or Hills, Sylvan Hills.
Speaker 3 (59:28):
Yeah yeah, yeah, like the commune and you know, the hood.
Speaker 4 (59:31):
Yeah yeah, yeah, no, no, I know where we're at.
Speaker 3 (59:34):
Yeah, like that.
Speaker 1 (59:34):
That's where I'm at, and I grew up not far
from there. My mom went to Sylvia High School in
the eighties. And so my point is, like, when I'm
down there, this is a community that has been the
hood for as long as I've been living, my mom's
whole life, and it is that way today, boarded up homes,
very transient, mostly renters.
Speaker 3 (59:52):
Like, it's that kind of community.
Speaker 1 (59:53):
And when I'm talking to people and their material conditions
did not change under Clinton. Whenever body was talking about
we're in economic boom. They did not change under Bush.
They're in bad shape under Bush, they were in bad
shape under Obama, they were in bad shape under Trump,
they were in bad shape under Biden. And now folks
are knocking on their door to tell you, tell them, hey, man,
(01:00:14):
you really gotta vote for Kamala Harris otherwise your life
is going to be really hard.
Speaker 3 (01:00:19):
And they're like, my life has been hard. Yeah, help
helped me understand the difference. What's the difference?
Speaker 1 (01:00:25):
That's the good. You have to acknowledge that this is
the reality. Now, where do we go from here? Now
we've acknowledged that this is the reality for many Americas,
many black Americans.
Speaker 3 (01:00:34):
Where do we go from here?
Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
I like to look at the number of votes in
each precinct, in each district, and oftentimes, man, it's a
couple hundred votes. Like oftentimes you're electing whole city council
members off of three thousand votes. So if you got
a guy who can mobilize one hundred and fifty three
(01:00:57):
hundred people, yeah, next tell you that your your point
is well to, is well made. That is political power.
If you can get that person to mobilize three hundred
people for four or five days straight.
Speaker 3 (01:01:11):
You own it strong.
Speaker 1 (01:01:13):
But you basically have chosen that's the person who will
represent your district.
Speaker 3 (01:01:18):
You've chosen that person.
Speaker 1 (01:01:19):
Now you are now the power broker for your district
because you know you can always mobilize enough folks to
get a person elected or to get a person removed.
And that's real power. That's real power that I don't
think that we've been told that we can actually affect.
I'll give a quick example. I live on a road
that's mad fast. I've been lobbying my city council member
(01:01:40):
for the last few months to slow this road down.
We just got a little speed sign thing that just
flashes how fast you're going. It's a step, right, it's
a step. And the thing is, when I called her
and said, hey, my role is kind of fast like it.
Speaker 3 (01:01:57):
It bothers me.
Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
I'm sitting at home on a Sunday watching people drive
way too fast down my road.
Speaker 3 (01:02:02):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
She's like, well, you're the first person to call about this.
I'm the first person. It's like hundreds of people that
live on this road.
Speaker 2 (01:02:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:02:08):
Yeah, and I'm the first person to call. Your voice
is actually so much. When you call your council member,
when you call your center, when you call your representative,
when you go to the mayor's office and you show up,
you are probably one of twenty five people who've shown up,
and all twenty four of the other people are like
all white women, all white say because they know how
to work it. They go get where they will how
to and so like you can have. What I'm trying
(01:02:30):
to say is like the government is not complicated. They
want you to think it's complicated, because then you kind
of get a little like brain fog and you feel like.
Speaker 3 (01:02:37):
It's not really worth it. I'm just go do what
I gotta do. It's not complicated.
Speaker 1 (01:02:40):
Show up, pull your homies together to show up, pull
your community together to show up, talk to people, and.
Speaker 3 (01:02:48):
It'll work. And so that's that's what I say.
Speaker 1 (01:02:51):
First of all, acknowledge what's going on, acknowledge the factor
that folks are rightfully cynical. And then second, let's create
some pathways. Let's give some actual next step for how
to engage.
Speaker 2 (01:03:01):
Yeah, bro, this couldn't have been better. It's like you
even like I mean, the cornerstone premise of this show
is what you just said, is that government's not that complicated.
You understand this more than you think you do. Oh yeah,
you know, and in a lot of ways. Again, one
of our cornerstone premises is like you've actually been doing
(01:03:22):
politics your whole life, like you've already been doing it,
it's just by a different name. Garson, Thank you so
much for doing this with us. Man, Can you please
plug all your plugs of like where they could follow you,
where they could see your videos?
Speaker 3 (01:03:37):
All that for sure? For sure.
Speaker 1 (01:03:40):
First of all, probably is a real honor. I don't
say that lightly. It's amazing to be here. Long time
admirer of your work.
Speaker 3 (01:03:47):
Man, don't tell me that, bro, Thank you man, serious,
I'm serious.
Speaker 1 (01:03:51):
Yeah, And so I'll say you can follow me on
social media's I'm Garrison Hayes on everything, at Garrison h
on Instagram, at Garrison hat on TikTok, at Harrison Haes
on YouTube, and you can find the link to the
rest of my stuff from any of those places in
my podiot that's.
Speaker 4 (01:04:07):
What it is.
Speaker 2 (01:04:09):
Once again, thank you so much, and please lock in
with this brilliant brain right here doing amazing stuff down
there in the A.
Speaker 4 (01:04:16):
Appreciate you, all right, y'all appreciate you. I get stop
and we're good. Zoe though.
Speaker 2 (01:04:34):
All right, now, don't you hit stop on this pod.
You better listen to these credits. I need you to
finish this thing so I can get the download numbers. Okay,
so don't stop it yet, but listen. This was recorded
in East Lost boil Heights by your boy Propaganda. Tap
in with me at prop hip hop dot com. If
(01:04:55):
you're in the Coldbrew coffee we got Terraform Coldbrew. You
can go there dot com and use promo code hood
get twenty percent off get yourself some coffee. This was mixed, edited,
and mastered by your boy Matt Alsowski Killing the Beat Softly.
Check out his website Mattowsowski dot com.
Speaker 4 (01:05:13):
I'm a speller for you because I.
Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
Know M A T T O S O W s
ki dot com Matthowsowski dot com. He got more music
and stuff like that on there, so gonna check out
The heat Politics is a member of Cool Zone Media,
executive produced by Sophie Lichterman, part of the iHeartMedia podcast network.
(01:05:36):
Your theme music and scoring is also by the one
and nobly Matt Awsowski. Still killing the Beat Softly, so listen.
Don't let nobody lie to you. If you understand urban living,
you understand politics. These people is not smarter than you.
We'll see y'all next week.
Speaker 3 (01:06:00):
Addition one
Host
Prop
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!