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February 28, 2024 48 mins

In part two of the Lost Cause myth, we connect the lost cause to the memory of Jan 6th.

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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Media.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
What's up y'all? Politics will prob Part two lost cause
got the LG Robert Robert Evans out this mug. Well,
maybe not the OG Robert Evans. The OG Robert Evans
passed away. You know what I'm saying, this Robert.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Evans, thus raising my, uh my profile significantly.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Bro. There's a there's an eighties like synth pop band
from Germany called Propaganda that for years, their like tour
schedule would intermix with mine on any of the like
RSS feeds, kind of pulling things. And when I tell
you how livid them, German foods was what they would

(00:44):
see by Pitcher and they would be so mad because
I'm not there Propaganda to the point of where like
I can I've only performed in Germany once because they
was upset. Yeah, you know, because you're like, they had
to be like propaganda USA hip hop.

Speaker 1 (01:04):
Probably American propaganda, German propaganda. Yeah, but they don't want
to be called German propaganda. That brings that brings people
some bad memories.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
Bad vibes. Yeah. Anyway, let's get into it. So we
left off with, Oh, anyway, I forgot Robert Sophie. Oh
I didn't forget I did say that so much on

(01:34):
the mine right now, Robert, Oh, yeah, the LG Sophie
ball playing. You know what I'm saying. You got a
shout out on one of these shows recently that I did.
I don't remember talking about you hooping and that, like
for you to be able to hoop at Hamilton, I
mean you could really hoop, because you'd have to really

(01:57):
be able to play to play over there. Yeah. If
she was like, oh, yeah, I played at San Juan Capistrano,
I'd be like, okay, you know anyway, sure, sure, Sophie,
Yeah you're a ballplayer. No, she played at Hamilton and
you can hoop. So the question was like, why did
it stick? How come the Union didn't push back? And

(02:20):
the answer is they did push back. The Confederates were
just they just drew blood first. They were by the time, yes,
by the time the Union got around to building cemeteries
and memorials, the Confederates had like ten years on them.

(02:40):
They had had ten years of putting up these things.
They already had their magazine up and running. They're in
their second generation of like support clubs, you know what
I'm saying. They're already at the Daughters of the Confederate
you know what I'm saying. So they they were already
up and running and established, and you know, is this
a normal phrase but like or phrase everybody else says.

(03:01):
But I know my uncle used to say, like a
lie travels the world twice yea before while the truth
is still trying to choose.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Yeah, I've heard it attributed to Mark Twain, but I
think there's a good chance that that is also a lie.
And right it was someone else entirely, yeah, which probably.

Speaker 2 (03:16):
Some black guy. Yeah, but yeah, So they were already
like they were already playing from behind, and then they
formed the Grand Army of Republic. Right now, what the
Confederate like Soldiers Association would do is they kept inviting
Union soldiers to Union like veterans to come to these

(03:36):
like mixers for like photo ops and stuff like that.
And obviously the Union like veterans were like fuck out
my face, Like hell, no, I'm not gonna go down there.
You know what I'm saying, Like, of course we're not
gonna do that. But what that would do is that
would change the moral footing. So if if the Union

(03:58):
soldiers like refuse to go, then now they look like
the barbarians. They're the ones. They're like I thought you
were about reconstruction. I thought you were about keeping the
Union together. You're not willing to sit down with us.
The war's over, now we're done. I'm trying to like, look, man,
we both shared this. We were both a little bit wrong.
You know, maybe there was some wrong on your side,
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (04:16):
Like it was a complicated time, Yeah it was.

Speaker 2 (04:21):
It was different. It was complicated. But can we at
least sit down and be civil so they could pull
the week and be civil? Thing? Right?

Speaker 1 (04:28):
Wow? Why you guys aren't willing to be civil? Okay, Okay,
you know, we just wanted to be friends.

Speaker 2 (04:32):
You know, listen, man, we're taking our l we Look,
we all we both fought valiantly. We both believed in
a cause.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
Who's to say who lost?

Speaker 2 (04:41):
Who's to say?

Speaker 1 (04:42):
Right?

Speaker 2 (04:43):
So that's kind of the thing. So and again, like
I said before, like this was happening after you know,
under originally under Reconstruction, like I said, the states were
broken into the districts. They were controlled by Union army
veterans who outlawed like Confederate celebrat So you wouldn't be
able to do no, like first anniversary, tenth anniversary, weren't

(05:03):
allowed to do that, right because martial law was there.
But martial law can only last for so long. And
then after that the First Amendment kicks in. Right, So
now that the First Amendment kicks in, you can't stop
them from these gatherings. So they would sit down, they
would have these reunions, and of course the union soldiers like, look, dude,

(05:24):
like I'm not really here for reconciliation with you. You
know what I'm saying, Like this is absurd. We feel gaslit,
like you were wrong and you were not brave, You
did not stand up for what you believe. You were wrong,
and you got shut down. But we'll go and take
these pictures right now. What's interesting is fast forward to now,

(05:49):
like follow me on this train of thought, you take
like the Israel and Godzas situation, right, And what all
all research shows, when I say all Robert Joseph Twain Evans, okay,
all research shows that the degree for which the state

(06:15):
security is heavy handed guarantees the continuation of the rebel
or extremists views. You create sympathy for the extremists, or
you birth a new one guarantees if you are too
heavy handed. Almost every person who has been like radicalized

(06:36):
in that sort of thing, they can almost always trace
their radicalization back to the treatment of the government security forces. Always, right,
So when you say I need to stamp out like well,
like is we're saying we got to stamp alhamas like
we got to stamp them out. We're going to trace
them wherever they're going. It's like, if you're only concerned

(06:59):
about this situation is the safety of Israel, then you
should then you should know what you're doing is wrong.
Even if even if you have no feelings towards the
people of Palaestime, what you're doing is not gonna guarantee safety.
As a matter of fact, it's guaranteeing a new hamas, right,
is what you're doing. So knowing this again, like I'm
talking about the complications of like the Union soldiers who

(07:21):
feel like I can't believe I have to deal with this.
We should have just hung y'all right, it's like, well,
in your brain, it's like, well, if we if we
come down too hard, it's we're gonna harden this these
people against us even more, right, But if we give
them any space, we're justifying their cause, Like are we

(07:42):
saying that? Like maybe what they're saying is legitimate. All
that to say is before you start getting on Twitter
and saying what a person should do is like it's complicated.
It's really hard to think through these things. You know,
this is obviously no stand report for Israel because what
they doing, like I said, it's VERI five be wrong.
You know what I'm saying, But it's complicated. It's like,

(08:04):
so what do you do do you be like, man,
y'all are stupid. I'm not gonna go down there at all.
But then if you do that again, you lose the
peace because now you look like the person that's not
willing to really come together in unity. Right. So they
were cool with taking the photo ops. They were down
with the reunion because that's what they fought for. But
we're not trying to reconcile with y'all, Like we're not friends.

(08:27):
Let's just make this work, like y'all live over there,
we live over there. It is what it is, but
like we're not homies right now. This means that by
nineteen thirty, by nineteen twenty to nineteen thirty, like the Confederates,
have won the story. They have now convinced the country that, like,
there's two sides to this, this is what we fought for.

(08:49):
It wasn't really about this slavery thing, because again you
have to remember Black people still don't have a voice
yet as a nation, like we're poking through here and there,
but as a collective commune unity, we don't have a
say in this because if we did, we would have
been like, hold up, guys, y'all, like for real, like y'all,
y'all believe in this shit, you know what I'm saying.

(09:10):
So we didn't, but we didn't have a We didn't
have a say yet. Right now, by the thirties, the
United Daughters of the Confederacy are absolutely killing it in
the monuments, like their statues everywhere, they're schools named after
Confederate soldiers because again, it's about it's about legacy. The
children of the Confederacy get this. Had a catechism. There

(09:34):
was a catechism for ages six to sixteen to where
you had to discuss. You had to know that. You
had to know your Bible figures, you know what I'm saying.
You had to know your characters, you had to know
how to story Willie when they were catechizing their kids. Sure,
so like how you compete with that? You know what
I'm saying, Like how you fight with that? You know? So?
So will you catechise your kids? You know what I'm saying, Like,

(09:56):
I don't know, how do you fight with that? Right?

Speaker 1 (09:58):
Universities, Yeah, do a little have a holiday every year
where you build a model of Richmond and burn it down.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
Right, old burning man styles.

Speaker 1 (10:09):
Right, have a yearly Sherman's March to the Sea festival.
You know what, I've talked myself into it. This is
a good call. Actually, actually it's what we should have done.

Speaker 2 (10:18):
That's what we should have done. Just annual burnings.

Speaker 1 (10:21):
Yeah, have a wicker Man. But it's like Robert E.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
Lee, it's all gray uniform and everything. Just light it
all fire.

Speaker 1 (10:28):
I'm on board with this idea.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
Now you might be stumbled onto some genius. Yeah, but yeah,
So like universities were getting, like Confederate Memorial Hall. There's
the Confederate Memorial Hall at Peabody College in Tennessee, which
established in nineteen thirty five. Now it's a part of
Vanderbilt University. Like they just removed the word Confederate in
twenty seventeen. Right, the dorms were the dorms were because

(10:56):
we're four. They had a dorm specifically for the daughters
of Confederates. See, like for their vets. Columbia, you had
a scholarship for Confederate descendants, so like, you know, if
you fought in war, like, we got a scholarship for you.
So they're creating legacy. It's like, look, it's not your fault,
you know what I'm saying. Your daddy fought valiantly and
now his cause was lost, but you should at least

(11:19):
not be suffering.

Speaker 1 (11:20):
For you should get a benefit from it, right, So
you should get it.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
He's still a veteran. They're still a veteran. They're still American. Right.
So you in elementary schools, you in churches, you in monuments,
you in the civic communities, and now you're in universities, right,
and you run in the school boards. Now this is
all happening in the South, right, because remember the country's

(11:45):
much bigger than the South at the time, but this
is happening there. Now. The question that came to my
mind at the time was like, well, well, how did
it leave the South, Like how did this idea and
make it anywhere else? And I mean the easiest answer

(12:05):
is like, well people moved. What I'm saying like, well,
you just move, you know, you move and you set
up shop. I remember one of my favorite movies at first,
one of the first documentaries I saw about LA in
the nineties was called Banging in Little Rock, and it
was about a crip gang in Little Rock, Arkansas. And
for the life of me, I could not understand how

(12:27):
that worked because they would be named because these these
these gangs would be named after neighborhoods in California. Like so,
I'm like, how are you How do you have a
neighborhood rolling sixty crip gang in Topeka? Like there is
no sixties. Yeah, I'm like, it's called sixties because it's
the sixties blocks, you know, sixty first to sixty nine.

(12:49):
That's why it's called sixties. You know what I'm saying,
West Side sixties is because.

Speaker 1 (12:54):
You don't even have sixty blocks in Little Rocks, you know, sixty.

Speaker 2 (12:57):
So like, why are you called that? I recalled, which
I think I've talked about a hood of politics before.
I recall being the seventh grader, you be on three
Way because that's how old I am. You on three
Way and be like, yo, uh, what happened to Andre?
You know what I'm saying, where Andre being? I ain't
seen them all summer? Oh, Andre had to go live
with his auntie because we would you start getting in trouble. Yeah,

(13:18):
they would go send you to live with granny. You
have to go live with ya, go live with granny.
So you would go, we would get sent south. You
would get sent to these other cities. And at that point,
you like you're a kid from La you already banging hoover.
You get out there, it's like I just really need
I just need three other dudes. I'll put them on.
You know what I'm saying that we just now we
run the city. So that's how these sets happened. Or

(13:40):
you in jail, like somebody or you know, somebody from Arkansas,
go to jail, you in a cell block with a
blood that dude puts you on. You go back to
your city, start running things, you know what I'm saying.
So it spreads because you move and you set up chapters.
So that's what they did. The Daughters of the Confederacy
started setting up chapters right in every state, and they

(14:01):
made textbooks, and the textbooks worked like they I can't
like it worked, they created textbooks.

Speaker 1 (14:11):
Well, and that's that's always such like such the effective tactic, right,
And it's it's because as we've been getting, as I
keep saying, like what makes these people win is the
fact that most people either aren't aware the fight is
going on, and so they get they get to rack
up a lot of un unconfronted hours or yes, it's

(14:31):
not a fight. People like you know, most people are
not don't pay attention to school board ship, don't pay
attention to like what's going on in the uh in
in like picking school books. So if that's your obsession,
if you can get a whole your whole team obsessed
with that fight, you can do a lot while nobody
went without being really confronted. You know, and as we

(14:52):
as we know, when they actually have to fight, Confederates
do badly. So they must refer to not have a fight.

Speaker 2 (14:58):
Yes, because they really they really don't want the smoke
in reality. Yeah, but you got books, you all that,

(15:29):
But like what really worked, the really what really did
it was the media, right, The birth of a nation
obviously did something to put to make these these clan
members seem like the protection of the pureness, of the
whiteness of the Southern woman, you know. Obviously, like the
plot of that story was like, these black brutes are ravaging,

(15:55):
you know, these pure southern white women, and the and
the and the and the clan comes in and they
save them, right. But much bigger than that is Gone
with the Wind in nineteen thirty nine.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
We had to watch that movie so many times as
a kid. I bet you did, or as hell.

Speaker 2 (16:14):
It's so slow and yeah, but that movie is like solidifies,
like it's this movie that we can you could actually
point out history. It's this movie that solidified that the
Civil War happened to the Confederacy, and that it was

(16:36):
Northern aggression, right, that caused this because the South was
living their way of life and the North had a
problem with their lay of life. It's because our memories
are extremely bad, right, And what we really remember, truthfully
is what something felt like. And what they're trying to

(16:57):
say is this is what it felt like. We're showing
you this movie that took place at this time, right,
And this movie was such a big hit that it
actually convinced America that that's really what the Civil War
was about, was about this movie, or it was about
northern aggression. And I got to tell you, man, the
first time I heard the term northern aggression, I thought

(17:19):
the person that said it to me made it up.
I was like, that's not a real word.

Speaker 1 (17:23):
There's no way, that's that's what I heard as a kid. Yeah,
I got that from and I'd heard that from a
number of people. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (17:29):
I was like, ain't no way, ain't no way.

Speaker 1 (17:31):
Y'all with an aggression. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (17:33):
I was like the I'm sorry, what now? Like, yeah,
that was the first time I ever heard that. I
was like, yeah, no, y'all, y'all made that shit up.
That is not a real word. But anyway, Yeah, Like
like the first time my wife said to me shacuterie board,
I was like, I mean, I'm talking like twenty twenty one.
I was like, that's not a real word. You made
that up. There's no speaking from the white woman collective

(17:56):
charcuterie board. Are you right? That's how fake of a
word it is.

Speaker 1 (18:01):
Yeah, it's like what you say, Robert, nobody does that. Yeah.
I like a nice croissant for for for breakfast.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
Sure, yeah, yeah, for brecky like you fact, like you
wouldn't pronounce those words incorrectly on purpose.

Speaker 1 (18:21):
Absolutely, I do that with everything. It's always purposeful.

Speaker 2 (18:23):
It's more fun, man. But yeah, like you think of
like field trips, you know, when you like and again,
like as a kid, you're not if this is just
what's in your textbook, you're not like a true believer.
It's just that's my homework, right, I'm like, who doesn't
when you're a kid, who doesn't just you know, don't

(18:44):
just trust they books, you know what I'm saying. Like,
and even it's not even about trusting it. It's like
that's just the assignment. This is like my history class.
And then there's a field trip and you're excited about
a field trip because it's just a field trip, like
you don't have to like care, but then when you
get home, but when you get back to class, you
have to write ten things that you liked about this monument,
you know what I'm saying. So in these schools, they

(19:04):
were going to Confederate monuments, which at this time had
been up for almost one hundred years, so now it
is history, you know what I'm saying. So, like when
you're that far away from it and it's just what
you have to do in class, and it's in your book.
It's like, that's just what it is. And then obviously

(19:27):
you fast forward to like we talked about the other
and fastward in nineteen eighty and now we're talking about
Dukes of hazard You feel me that, Like I kind
of feel like now the more I know about the
Lost cause anybody with some sense should have said this
show should have never got greenlit, like how did this
make it own the TV? But this is how? And I,

(19:50):
like I said another one. I loved it. I loved
the Dukes of Hazards. The term listen, listen, listen, listen
colored folks that's watching this or that's listening to this.
You know the word Daisy Dukes the gene shorts.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
Oh yeah, it's her.

Speaker 2 (20:05):
That was her name. She was Daisy Duke and she
used to wear cut off short and part of culture.
It's an important part of Robert, It's important part of
black culture. Like Daisy Dukes, what we call cut off
geen shorts is her, Like it's so crazy, what I
finally put it all together right? And so it spread

(20:27):
from these textbooks. It's spread from these movies, and don't
forget these people are still racist. Just at the end
of the day, y'all still hate black people, and they
still didn't want race or set slavery to end. So
whatever you color, whatever other things you add on top
of this, let's get to the shit nugget. The shit
nugget is you're still just racist and nobody wanted slavery

(20:50):
to in.

Speaker 1 (20:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (20:52):
Now, let's fast forward to nineteen sixties. Again. Something I
never thought about until reading this is like it's a
Civil War centennial. I never thought about that that there was,
oh my gosh, in the nineteen sixties, there's you're gonna
have to do some sort of memorial because it's one
hundred years since we almost lost our country, right, And

(21:15):
the US created a National Commission to air quotes celebrate
the war in hopes so that, yes, yes, in hopes
to reconcile right the country. Now, there was nothing about
the emancipation of slavery. Right, So the South realized since

(21:40):
that wasn't a part of this celebration of war. It
was about like the bringing back of the Union, the
fact that we almost lost our country. It wasn't about
freeing the slaves. The people of the South realized, like, yo,
this is our chance to reinnite white people, right because listen,
you got brown versus Board of Education in Little Rock.
Got They already feel like they're losing so much ground.

(22:01):
This is a civil rights movement, so they already feel
like even though they might be winning the piece and
this narrative is still is still being perpetuated. They're like,
but we're still losing. They're like, one hundred years later, like,
get this idea. One hundred years later, they still feel
like they're being invaded by the Yankees again because now

(22:25):
you're telling me we have to like we have to
we have to let them come into our restaurants, we
have to drink from the same drinking fountains from them.
We now have to let them into our schools. And
the government is making us do this right. Remember you
had to say I had to send the Federal truths
to protect the little girl from walking into to her
school in Little Rock, Right. So the narrative again that

(22:46):
they're believing is like it's happening all over again. One
hundred years later, you're still making us do this right,
So this is our chance to do this right. So
they do under the US National Commission. To celebrate the war,

(23:07):
they put together something I didn't know, a new one
hundred year celebration commemorating the inauguration of Jefferson Davis.

Speaker 1 (23:20):
All the people like, yeah, the guy who led our
country into a who let our fucking bullshit fake country
into a ditch. Yes, yeah, let's celebrate that guy. Calender
Richmond having buildings, Thank god he got rid of them
for us, and the foolish North had to spend all
that money on fire.

Speaker 2 (23:41):
Stupid Yes, Montgomery, Alabama. So they got to commemorate the
Southern way of life, which was how they did it.
So they they're like, we're facing these things one hundred
years later, so we're gonna remember our Southern way of life.
They've totally reenacted period, perfect specific clothing, and they reenac
acted the inauguration of Jefferson Davis.

Speaker 1 (24:03):
I whish they'd reenact Pickett's charge. We could deal with
a problem now.

Speaker 2 (24:09):
We really had something going on there, right And again
they're talking about the overstepping of the Feds, right. So,
and it was at that point in nineteen sixty one
is when Confederate flags started going into our state buildings.
Was at this these people actually thought putting together a

(24:35):
national commission to celebrate the war would actually unite us.
Right now, what's happening at this moment is while this
is all going on, Confederate flags are going back up
on buildings. The South still feels like they're being encroached.
Is this little thing called the civil rights movement, which
is different. Now, this ain't the eighteen sixties. Black people

(24:56):
can read, you know, I'm saying, we can read, we
own the TV, we got money, now, we got education.
Now there's a thing called and this was super interesting
that it was a cool connection in my own life.
Would you know anything about like the Ebony or Jet magazines.

Speaker 1 (25:14):
I mean, I've heard of Ebony magazine. I haven't heard
of Jet really, but.

Speaker 2 (25:17):
Jet magazine was it was like half the size. It
was almost like a five x seven fold out. It
was a little thicker most of it. For us, it
would be like our grandma's you know, Aunties had like
a subscription to them.

Speaker 1 (25:30):
Whereas Ebony kind of like Esquire bas Ebany's big.

Speaker 2 (25:33):
Yeah, it was a big magazine right with the bigger
articles and stuff like that. It was like the size
of like Jet magazine was like the size of like
a TV guide, and you would have like black actors, actresses,
like like just black Hollywood inside on the covers and

(25:54):
inside of things. So it was like we were telling
our stories now, you know what I'm saying. It was
a we now have again, there's an actual market we
have you know, liquid, you know, income to be able
to build and propagate our culture. Right and again, anybody
in my age, remember they used to have this thing
called the Jet magazine Beauty of the Week. So you'd

(26:15):
flip to a magazine, you'd flip to the middle and
it would be the Beauty of the Week, and it
was just some like black woman that was in Hollywood,
kind of like scantily clad, like in like a bathing
suit or whatever. And a lot of our culture, which
you may or may not know this, but this is
a very important part of the story, is around like

(26:37):
the barbershop or the beauty salon. Now. So for me,
as the youngest of two sisters and a mother, oftentimes
my barber was at the same beauty shop as where
my mother and my sister got their hair done. Now,
so we'd have to go eight in the morning, right,

(26:59):
sit there. Every two weeks and I'm we get there
at eight. I'm done by a thirty, right. But the
thing with black women in the hair, you gotta wash it.
They sit under the blow dry to let it dry.
This is where they gossip. Right, So we're not out
of there till like one pm. So by eight fifteen,

(27:21):
for four hours, I'm just sitting there, Right, what do
you do? Well, you have your little sexual awakening looking
at the jet magazines, right, so you just sitting there
looking at all this black beauty and just understanding its culture.
But anyway, it was like I say all that to say,
like it was it's this, this is where you get
essence from and Vibe magazine and just just this like

(27:41):
black print media that showed black people all over the country,
just like the full gambit of our experience, you know
what I'm saying. So it was such an important part
of us telling our own story now while this is happening.
Why this is so important is because cause the South

(28:03):
is trying to the lost cause people are trying to
create this narrative about what the Civil War was. Now
there's a body to counteract it, right, And the body
to counteract it was the voice of black people period. Right.
That was like, you are not able to tell us

(28:25):
what happened. We know what happened, and you know what happened,
and we know what you're doing is the exact same thing,
right now, we know it, right, So people like so
part of the aggression arounds, not just like I think
it's a very important to stay part of the aggression.
Why it was so infuriating for the segregated South at

(28:47):
the time was because now there's a compounded voice to
push back against their narrative, right, a voice that now
has financial power or and cultural sway. Right, you could hate,
you could hate Doctor King, which is what they did,
you know what I'm saying. But Doctor King exists partially

(29:11):
at the scale he does because of black print media.
Because now it's not just church networks. Now it's not
just us talking about South. The whole country can be
involved and we can show you right with our printed things,
with our movies, with our media, to be like we're
not what they say we are, matter of fact, you
love everything we've given you to this world, you know

(29:31):
what I'm saying. So, so that's Centennial and their reenactment
of Montgomery, of Jefferson Davis's inauguration. Why it's not in
most of our history books is because black people stepped
up and was like, fuck that shit, right, which I
think is a great moment in history. Again, one hundred

(30:20):
years later, which is the interesting part of this. Again,
one hundred years later, you're celebrating the success of the
Civil War, but we're still not free. One hundred years later,
we're still not free. This is what black people are saying, like,
we're still not free. So I don't understand what the

(30:43):
fuck you're celebrating, Like, we're still not free. Fam you
know what I'm saying. And that became a narrative that
started to take over. So at this point, this lost cause,
which reached its height in the sixties, is now is
going to see the beginning of its decline because we
can now talk for ourselves. You fast forward through the

(31:04):
Cold War, where we stopped fighting against each other essentially
and started fighting against communism. So this kind of became
sort of a background, kind of like just something that
just existed in weird racist spaces because the rest of
us had moved on to all that is evil coming

(31:24):
from the Red block, right, coming from the Iron Curtain, right.
So that's what happens out there. Now, fast forward to
twenty eleven, because at twenty eleven would have been the
one hundred and fiftieth mark of the Civil War. Right
and the state Commission figured out, Yo, we really botched

(31:47):
that first one, right, Like we really were sleep we
really were sleeping at the wheels the first time we
tried to do this commemoration a thing. So they were like,
we're going to try to fix it. So they put
together state commissions that were going to talk about slavery
and reconstruction. Right. But in twenty ten, Charleston, South Carolina

(32:08):
held what was called the Suspensions Ball, celebrating secession from
the Union. And in February twenty eleventh, the Confederate Heritage
Rally happened in the capital of Montgomery, Alabama, which I
hope gives credence and a little more understanding to the

(32:28):
fade in the water that happened last year. Like you
have to understand, this is the city, you feel me.
This the city that re enacted Jefferson Davis's inauguration. They
tried to do it again, right, So they was like, yeah, okay, listen,
we need to start whooping some asses. You're still saying

(32:49):
like I didn't had it you feel me? So, so
these are the things that are happening around this time.
But like I said, it's in these like sort of
weird pointy but it's as recent as twenty eleven that
this thing happened. Now fast forward to twenty fifteen, Dillion
roof happened, right, because the Lost Cause narrative around our

(33:11):
lifetime had really just kind of moved into like the
four Chan and just like the weird worlds of the Internet.
Because again, the Internet exists and most people can read
and you could say, well, clearly this is bullshit, Like
most people, most logical Americans were able to be like, nah,
I mean, I see why our parents say that maybe
it was a part of the thing some of us obviously,

(33:32):
like we said before, the fact that the fact that
it continued, is it continued in ways that were more subtle.
The fact that it's now cemented parts of it that
what you brought up when we were doing the other episodes,
parts of it that have have like slowly kind of
like subtly creeped into the historical narrative. That that meant

(33:54):
that like it was hard for us to be able
to tell fact from fiction. It was hard for us
to be able to tell which is just lost cause
and which is actual history. So the germs of it
has continued into our understanding of what what we think
the Civil War was about. Right, And it's only like

(34:17):
historians and like educators are able to parse through and
step and be like no, no, no, no no no, that's specifically this,
that's specifically that. So but the but the remnants of it,
like you said, the big the Big Head Book children's
book thing still had elements of the lost Cause narrative,
but nobody was calling it the lost Cause because at

(34:39):
this point, again, monuments are on the are being built
around Virginia. There's all these like Jefferson Davis statues and
all stuff. It's kind of just a part of life.
And people just kind of understood that, Like, look, dude,
the South wanted to do this. They built their minds
because they really they were just mad they lost whatever. Right,
but it was a part of the thing. Now, Dyllian
Roof happened, right, And when that happened, when the the

(35:00):
Queen Breknewsome climbed up the flagpole in front of the
South Carolina Courthouse and pulled the Confederate flag down right,
who Nikki Haley actually tried to take credit for, which
I still think it's hilarious. But we all saw it,
fam like we all saw her climb up. You had

(35:21):
been governor for a while, you could have taken that
down a long time ago. Anyway, when Dylan Roof happened,
I think America actually realized that, like the lost cause
is not gone at all. It just moved right and
when it came back, it came back in a way,

(35:43):
which I think was super interesting because during that time,
obviously twenty fifteen Dylan Roof happened, Black Lives Matter is
now a thing. You know what I'm saying. Monuments are
getting torn down across the country because they're like listen, dude,
like they never should have been put up in the
first place. This is absurd. We need to tear these
things down. You need to take down these flags, and
you take down these things. So now there was during

(36:06):
that I actually remember this, but it's now in the
historical record. I forget home girl's name, but in front.
But while all this is happening in twenty fifteen and sixteen,
like in our life, while all this is happening. There
was a lady in the front of the Charleston, South
Carolina Courthouse, dressed in full Civil War guard with a

(36:28):
sign that said, these people's lives matter too, right, and
she was saying that the lives of the Confederate soldiers
matter too. So while you're taking down this flag and
saying that black lives matter, well, what about their lives?
These are This is our history, which if you've been

(36:48):
following the historical narrative, you see, oh here it is again,
this is the Lost Cause narrative. You're trying to tell
me that they were they were valiant. So and it
was that moment twenty fifteen, during the Black Lives Matter thing,
that the Lost Cause came back into its full glory
because but nobody knew it was called that, you know

(37:12):
what I mean, It was called all Lives Matter, it
was called you understand I'm saying, it was called something else. Right,
So this argument around like, well it's heritage not hey,
like you know what the rebel flag actually stands for,
you know, and all these things is is we watched,
in our own mind, in our own life, a rewriting

(37:33):
of something that we already understood, which brings me again
to the part that I said in the first one,
which it was like, I almost have empathy for you
because the fortitude it takes to reconstruct reality for yourself

(38:01):
is scary. It's scary to have to reconstruct reality, right, So,
whether it was actual Confederates or people in our modern times,
having to really realize that everything they've learned about their
history is bullshit and that you have to really be
willing to let that go and walk away from what

(38:24):
you've known to be reality is very difficult, you know,
because now when you're looking at these monuments to Robert E.
Lee Jefferson Davis, your connection to it is now just
a nostalgia that actually is separate from the actual Confederates.
It's just, you know, he was born in two thousand

(38:45):
and two. You've just been this. You see the statue,
you know what I'm saying, when you were going to
get ice cream after kindergarten. It's like, I'm now just
used to this because it's my own history. I have
this emotional connection to this. And then somebody tells you like,
well that's a statue, you to a piece of shit
and it needs to go down, And you're like well,
but it's like, but now it's my history, you know,

(39:06):
and what do I do with the fact that it's
my history? Right? Anyway, I'll close it with this, when finally,
when the monuments to Robert E. Lee were torn down
in New Orleans, the Mayor of New Orleans when he
finally removed the monument in twenty seventeen, he says, this

(39:27):
monuments Confederate like Confederate monuments, purposefully celebrate a fictional, sanitized Confederacy,
ignoring the death, ignoring the sale, enslavement, and ignoring the
terror that it actually stood for. It is self evident
that these men did not fight for the United States
of America. They fought against it. They may have been warriors,

(39:51):
but in this cause they were not patriots. Yeah, they
were warriors for long yep. And that's the lost cause
we were actually right. We were just out gunned and
out manned.

Speaker 1 (40:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:09):
And when you put it in books, you know, let
this be a lesson to us, all, you.

Speaker 1 (40:13):
Know, don't let your enemies write the books.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Don't let them write the books. I do think it's
an interesting thing to like, like when you hear in
a time where like with you know, disinformation and like
you know and AI and shit like how it kind
of feels like whack a mole, you know what I'm saying,
Like cause but you have but like in some sens like,

(40:36):
we have to stay vigilant. You have to shut the
shit down immediately, you know, because if it takes roots,
then one hundred and fifty years later, I'm still trying
to explain to somebody that, like, no, that's made up,
that's not you weren't patriots. What are you talking about?

Speaker 1 (40:54):
Yeah, well this is always cool. I love Uh. Yeah,
you got it right when you said it's like whack
a mole, right where. Yeah, Unfortunately, the only way to
actually win is to maintain vigilance until the last people
with a vested interest in changing the narrative die. Yeah,

(41:15):
and every generation.

Speaker 2 (41:18):
Until the machine breaks.

Speaker 1 (41:20):
Yeah exactly. Not no, because we didn't, I mean, because
we ignored it for decades. Yeah, the government gave up,
and then we tried to pretend it would go away,
and it just got stronger.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
Yeah. You think to yourself again, like surely, the the
obviousness of just how absolutely absurd what they're saying you
you you think you don't have to say anything. You
think you just have to be like, well, that's stupid,
nobody's gonna believe that, and then people believe it, right,
and then and then you're where you are now. You

(41:52):
know what I'm saying, It feels so modern, That's what
I'm trying to say, is this conversation feels so current
to me, even in the sense that like we're essentially
wrestling with the same we're experiencing the same sort of
like storytelling and story shaping, because again, memory is about
the present, it's not about the past, right so like

(42:13):
we're experiencing that right now with our own political makeup
or what's happening all of Russia, Ukraine, you know, Israel, Gaza,
like America, like our politics, we're experiencing it right now,
Like like our memories are being fought over right now,
Like you're like some there, you're trying to capture the
story and shape it in a way that we have

(42:38):
one hundred and fifty two hundred, three hundred thousand years
of evidence that says you can't let the cement settle.
You know what I'm saying, Like you you can't, you
can't let them win the story, you know, And in
a sense, it's like I'm not saying I have the

(42:58):
right story, you know what I'm saying Like, I'm not
saying that. I'm just saying, but you don't get to
you don't get to craft it. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (43:05):
Yeah, I think you can't stop lighting their ship on
fire until there's nothing left to light on fire. And unfortunately,
you know, as I'll do credit to Sherman, we needed
more people starting fires down there.

Speaker 2 (43:21):
Yes, we needed more people starting Yeah. So that's the
Lost Cause and hopefully we never got to talk about
this nigga again.

Speaker 1 (43:29):
Yeah. I think this is the end of him finally.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
So yeah, So if you haven't caught up, if you
haven't checked out the Robert E. Lee episodes, they are
or Bobby the episodes, they are on the Bastard Feed.
These Robbie Robbie, these are obviously on the Politics Feed.
And we're gonna look to do more crossovers like this
as time goes on.

Speaker 1 (43:53):
Hell yeah, absolutely all right, everybody, I love you me too.
I don't buy damn.

Speaker 2 (44:13):
Okay future prop here. I just want to make sure
this tie in is clear. I promised that I would
connect the Lost Cause to January sixth, and here's the
tie and I was trying to say, it's still the
spirit that there's an aggression from the government that's robbing
you of your way of life. I mean, that's the

(44:35):
organizing point around the mega phenomenon, is there was a
way that America is supposed to be and these liberal
progressive you know, you can substitute that phrase for Northerners
are pushing their way of life on us right, and

(44:55):
we have to fight back. Now. If and when the
insurrectionist type moment in culture finally gets squashed, it's it's
almost like you're watching a new lost cause narrative be birth.
It's like Trump Trump didn't get his position because the

(45:17):
whole you know, government was against him. You know what
I'm saying, the the the deep state was against him.
You know, he would have won. If it wasn't for this,
he would have Our movement would have been better if
it if we were just out numbered, we had the
courts against us. It's it's still just a lost cause
type situation. And if and when the insurrectionist type moment

(45:44):
in culture finally gets squashed, it's it's almost like you're
watching a new lost cause narrative be birth. It's like
Trump Trump didn't get his position because the whole you know,
government was against him. You know what I'm saying, The
deep state was against him. You know, he would have won.

(46:05):
If it wasn't for this, he would have Our movement
would have been better. We were just outnumbered, We had
the courts against us. It's still just a lost cause
type situation. And if we're not careful, we're just watching
January sixth insurrection become a new loss cause, a new
way that this loss cause idea or concept comes into

(46:30):
a new life. And the same way that, like the
Civil Rights movement was a new iteration of the Civil
War argument, which is they're taking our way of life,
They're forcing their way of life on us. So I'm
just saying, like, like what I was trying to say
ultimately is like same. They's all right, all right, now,

(47:00):
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 Eastlows,
boil Heights by your Boy Propaganda. Tap in with me
at prop hip hop dot com. If you're in the

(47:20):
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 Beast Softly.
Check out his website Matdowsowski dot com. I'm a speller
for you because I know M A T. T O

(47:43):
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. The Politics is a
member of cool Zone Media, Executive produced by Sophie Lichterman,
part of the iHeart Media podcast network. Your theme music
and scoring is also by the one and nobly mattow Sowski.

(48:06):
Still killing the beats 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.
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