March 17, 2022 • 40 mins
As they depart for their respective tours, LF & DK kick off a three-part series on liberation movements born and bred in Birmingham, Alabama, this time discussing the alliance between the Alabama Communist Party and poor Black folks during the Great Depression era.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Uh, we're waiting on reparations. Uh uh dis the history book.
So let me tell you the tailor featt Labina Communist
part of the deprection era, TIY getting scared off for
the sheriffs and share cropping for bear from the black folks.
Parado with the fair forms. You came and said, I folks,
they try to turn your lights off or to not you.
(00:24):
Right the book we run up on the move rightful
to live, susicidal, but the black folks was kind of weird.
They couldn't really read. But they consist of him too.
Then and then this alliance and red and black and
the white would later lay the frame before the fights
of Rosa Parks and Aye Davis. So when they say
that it's boxing gets the grave and punch of racist historically,
the kind of holds up. Actually, you're listening to waiting
on reparation, the production of Iheartard, good morning or afternoon
(00:52):
or pending on when you're listening to this. If you're
listening to this when it just came out, then happy St.
Patrick's Day, yeah, or if or if it's after that, Um,
take some baby profen, you'll drink some waters. Um calling
calling to work calling sick. I don't need you, It wouldn't.
(01:15):
I mean maybe if you're like a school crossing guard
for like an elementary school, maybe don't call out the
children needs you. But I mean otherwise who cares. Very fine.
I think everybody's definitely gonna take notice of the subdued
intro this morning, I know why the hell I'm tired?
(01:37):
What why are you? So? I am in Waco, Texas
this morning? Your drove to Waco. So yeah, see what
happened was see what had happened was, um, I'm gonna
go to the south by Southwest UM. And we had
a show in Birmingham and Saturday in Birmingham a couple
of days. Decided to talk to you all about some
(01:59):
of that, um you know which has inspired this week's episode.
So Young a Bremenham for a couple of days, which
worked my interest in doing this show. But um, you know,
our hope to drive about halfway and stop was shattered
when we got to the hotel that we had booked
(02:20):
um online and it was not only mad sketchy, it
was so sketchy that we rolled up to check in
and they were like, oh yeah, we don't accept the
electronic payment. I was like, what do you mean I
paid online for Then they were like, nah, it doesn't count,
it doesn't count. So I'm pretty sure these I'm pretty
sure these cats just took my money and just you
(02:41):
wouldn't give us a room. And so, man, there's just
so much to unpack about everywhere we've been so far.
But ultimately we like tried to find hotels like, you know,
an hour out, two hours out, and finally we're just like, yo, look, Paul,
grandma lives in Wago. We make it a way goo good.
(03:03):
Oh no, no, no, it's just me as holm with
you know, Grandma, etcetera. But um, so we ended up driving,
you know, we might to drive like six hours. I
ended up being Mark Elevan, So my voice may sound
a bit scrutchy, and I may seeund a bit tired
because that happened. But I mean, along the way, a
lot of really dopeness has transpired. So part of why
(03:27):
getting here took us along because we stopped for three
hours in jack Mississippi and had lunch with Jerry Mitchell.
Are you feeling with Jerry Mitchell's Jerry Mitchell is the
investigative reporter that solved the unsolved murders of Mega Everts
and of the case of the Birmingham church bombings and
(03:50):
a number of other like civil rights cold cases. Yeah,
and so like this was the dude that put a
bunch of klansmen in jail for like murdering civil rights heroes.
So yeah, there was a there was a movie about
the trial for like the killer of Betyar Everest called
The Ghost of Mississippi with Alec Baldwin and Woopy Goldberg
(04:16):
and James Would I believe, But I wonder, I can't remember.
I wonder who played that reporter that because I'm sure
he would have to have been a character that I
gotta look it up. And also he was super cool
and nice. I would love to have him on the
show to talk about his work. Um as well. In Birmingham,
we had the opportunity to hang out with Isaiah Thomas,
that one of the lee organizers of the Amazon unionization
(04:40):
effort twenty years old Ball of Lightning, Like I thought
you meant the Isaiah Thomas, I'm sorry, no, no, no, no,
no no. Was cool. So lots of interesting Birmingham history uncovered,
and of course in this trip that I would love
us to you know, touch on in like a multiply
(05:01):
MultiPark series on the city, because yeah, I think that's
an awesome idea of I mean, just from the stuff
that we got for today, it's it's definitely a rich
history that you can really dig into. Birmingham is a
wild place, has been, perhaps always will be. I've only
(05:22):
been I've only been to Birmingham once. I think it
was to do like a it's like secret Stages or something.
Oh yeah, wait so we um we played the Syndicate
Lounge for this hip hop series called The Bottom Mix.
Actually hung out with Brish. Yeah. So um, rich history,
rich music scene, that lots to cover. So today we're
(05:44):
going to dig on into some lesser known history um
of Birmingham. We'll see what we'll see what we get
there a month to return to the topic because there's
so much to say. But you're about to get out
on the road yourself. It was my understanding. Yeah, just
doing like a short little run. I'm doing some St.
Patty's show tomorrow and then I'm doing something else in
(06:07):
North Carolina the day after that. So it's just gonna
be you know, a traveling weekend and I'm also um
coming out with a new there's a new EP that
I was dropping with an Atlanta producer named Josiah Soren.
But it's like a low fi, jazzy sort of thing.
It's just like, you know, three songs. But we've we've
(06:27):
been cutting the video and it's like running down to
the wire. So it's like in between the podcast and
the video then having to go out of town this
and then our city in Savannah. Savannah has last time
I checked, I think like the third or fourth biggest St.
Patrick's Day like celebration, I guess in the country here. Yeah,
(06:49):
it's weird, right, but like we're about to have an
influx of like two hundred thousand people. Yeah, so it's
it's about to be crazy here. Where to park, It's
it's it's everything's whack, and you know, it's just been
a hectic week. So we don't want to we don't
want a front. Our aesthetic is is you know, we
(07:10):
can real low five boom bad. This is going to
be very much in the spirit of those you know,
MF Doom transitions between anime cartoons at one AM, where
it's kind of like hazy, laid back. Yeah, as we
get into some less of known history of the city
of Birmingham. Event all right, we'll be with that after
(07:31):
the jump. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, we are back. So
you have this adventure in Birmingham. Where do you want
to start as far as like the history or something
(07:54):
about it that not too many people know about. So,
I mean I would characterize this as like quote unquote
all the way act. But and thinking about that, I
imagine there's even while their history even farther back than
you know here, the Great Depression era, um, if we
get into slave re abolition, indigenous folks, etcetera. But I
did want to start out talking about this era because
(08:16):
it is well documented in Robin D. G. Kelly's book
Hammer and Hoe, from which we take the title of
this episode. Um. So while we're talking about the Depression era,
I wanted to also capture this as a part of
a larger tendency in the media to sort of just
like forget about the South, like we like, despite the
fact we have this very rich history of liberation struggle,
(08:39):
um against the oppressive forces that are perhaps you know,
more visible, particularly brutal. You still see like coastal liberals
like making fun of the South every time Republicans like
are awful. I think ab how like in Georgia, like UM,
voter suppression bills raised calls to boycott the states outside
(09:00):
of the the state, even though like nobody in the state
wanted that. Um. I think about people joking that like
in Texas, Kentucky, like all these survivors of like weather
disasters deserve their state's horrible relief responses because quote unquote
like they voted for their leaders despite the fact that
like majorities of people don't vote at all. So let's
(09:22):
you know, not even talk about that. I guess here
then again, you know, I'm back in our own state
once and once more thinking about how many progressives, um
and leftists we had elected to various levels of government. Um.
When you hear about like successful left electoral projects, you
think about New York, or you hear about it in Nevada.
But they ain't gotta love, they ain't gonna love people
(09:45):
in the in the South fighting for their freedom. So
I think Germingham is a great example of history that
goes untold. Okay, So just because you you brought that
up in terms of like, you know, the like you said,
the liberal like thing of like, oh, let's boycott the
state or business businesses should pull out of the state
(10:05):
because of something they're doing. What's what is like another
UM effective I guess like political like repercussion or punishment
that you can do when some of these gerrymander Georgia
legislatures like do wild shit that's not really in tune
with the rest of the countrys something you can do
(10:27):
to affect the officials or to affect the government that
instilled that. Since you said, like a lot of the
population doesn't vote and there's people there who have that
will be affected by like boycotts and stuff, yeah, I
mean send resources to organizations that are organizing in the
state that are doing voter registration and voter education and
a voter turnout efforts, etcetera. Because like, yeah, boycott's hurt
(10:51):
working people. I mean, if the working people call for
it and they're like down for that, then desk what's up?
In this case, A lot of folks that UM are
part of who have been drawn Georgia by like the
expanding film industry, are folks that vote Democrat, and those
are folks that are going to be harmed by a
boycott and I'd be like, well, you guys, I got
to move back to California because, like you know, the
(11:14):
movie sets shut down because no one wanted to do
business here anymore, actually further cementing Republican power in this state.
But like, yo, if you you know, take that, if
you know, if you want to do a little boycott, fine,
um you know, like, oh, I'm not gonna buy Coca
Cola because they gave fifty grand to like the author
of the Senate bill making it illegal to hand out
(11:35):
water in voting lines or whatever. You know, all right,
take the twenty bucks and give it to like um
UM Asian American's Advancing Justice or UM put their Latino
X which they you know, get out the vote for,
you know, in Hispanic community or something. Because then actually
you're you're fighting the problem by helping people, the people
fighting the problem fight the problem. You know what I'm saying,
(11:57):
I feel I feel conflicted about it, because I mean,
on one hand, I definitely hear what you're saying, and
I mean I agree with it, But then there's just
like another part of it where it's like, what can
you do to these big entities other than hurt their pockets?
I mean at the end of the day, and it's
unfortunately the ship has trickled down because of the way
everything is tied up together. But like when we were
(12:18):
talking about the NFL a couple of weeks ago, you know,
that's the only about the easiest way to get that
to happen would be to boycott the NFL for them
to lose money because of it, And that would not
only affect the billionaires, but it would probably affect a
lot of low level people worse than it would affect
the billionaires. But that would be something tangible of like
(12:39):
over losing viewership or losing money. People are buying jerseys anymore. Okay,
they're upset because of what. All, right, let's change that.
But when you're doing that against actively against the wishes
of the people who are doing the work in the state,
like what, why why would you do that? Like literally,
I was getting arguments with people not in Georgia about
the boycott in Georgia and trying to be like no,
(13:00):
like I lived here, Like I know what I'm talking about,
Like no one is asked for this. I appreciate your intent,
and people even being condescending in that regard as well.
Like well, you know, shut out whatever, like just being
so insistent that they want to do things the way
they want to do things, even if though they have
no inside knowledge of what is happening and are just
(13:23):
so and so self consistent and just like blaantly disrespecting
like what people are actually asking for that are in
these impacted communities, um and have been doing this organizing
for a long time. So that's the thing. I mean,
you're absolutely right that hitting them in their pockets is effective.
But like if that's like if you're just going over
like over and around what people are actually asking you
(13:45):
to do, like it's not actually about the issue for you,
it's about being on some kind of moral high horse
and like an eco trend. Okay, you know, I don't
want to get this is again, this is why you,
like you said, this episode is an union of discussions.
I don't want to get two bogged out in any
one topic. But oh yeah, let's keep it rolling. Definitely,
I definitely thought of an addition to that. But okay,
(14:06):
we can we can come back to this if we
have to save this snippet for something else. But anyway, so,
um so, yeah, people, people forget about the South, they're like, oh,
you know, they've been bes Bridge and like the Freedom Writers.
But like, um, especially with like the CRT bands trying
to happen, you're certainly not going to hear about some
(14:26):
of this kind of stuff. I mean, you can't even
hear about like traditional civil rights history, let alone like, um,
some of the stuff I'm goot to tell you about
today obscure esoteric, like yeah, yeah, okay. So, um So,
this book that I referenced Robin D. G. Kelly is
Hammer and How is a history of the Alabama Communist
(14:48):
movement during the Great Depression. And let me just sell
you it is a completely and totally wild read. Um, Like,
I just it's really it's going to be very hard
for me to capture because my mind was just excuse
me what? Um So? In it, Kelly describes the way
that black workers um brought existing traditions of resistance to
(15:09):
racial depression into development of a unique version of Marxism,
and how the Communist Party came to attract a substantial
number of um, African American workers in Alabama, so like
fight for like, you know, struggles that we typically think
of in a Great Depression. Eary of you know, getting
welfare and you know, just the means to survive when
(15:31):
that somebody could put out of work obviously, the right
to vote, just fighting racial terrorism by the clan and
the police, etcetera. Um, And so we think of it,
it's just like oh that type of silver right struggle.
But like in Birmingham during the Great Depression, like the
folks that were like about that life are real for real.
We're like straight up like communists apparently like straight like
(15:55):
not like the we're just going to call you communists
because no exactly. And speaking of that, I want to
go ahead and give this caveat, I mean regouts caveat
as much as it's just like something I've been thinking
about lately because I've been waiting for the day that
someone tries to ask me if I'm a communist because
that's like the scary like and I've been thinking about
it because I'm not. But I'm like, Okay, the answer
(16:19):
I think it's legitimately is that I'm not because I
don't even think I know what communism really is, and
neither does anyone. Most most anyone that would ask either
of us that question, like doesn't know what it is either. Um, essentially,
I'm sorry, I said no, no, no no, I mean, I'm
just I was going to add to that as is
I feel the same way. It's like, I'm not but
(16:43):
I don't go ahead. I'll finish with my thought after you, okay.
I will say that I am vaguely familiar with it
as an idea I guess as like moneyless, classless, stateless society.
But I literally don't even know what that means either,
Like it's just really hard to imagine. So I would
essentially say that I I'm kind of too down to
be a communist. There's a lot of big books you
(17:03):
got to read and stuff. I hear. It seems I
don't know, it's some kind of that's from like a
theory sort of more scholarly standpoint, I guess, because there's
got to be like a more what's the word, There
has to be a more like proletariat understanding because into
(17:25):
it's not like, hey, I have to read some fucking
gigantic book of theory by seven different Russian dudes. That's
a good point because these cats down here in the
Great Depression era, like they couldn't read a lot of
them exactly. So now I'm like wait a second, how
do they How did they get so into this stuff?
Like I don't know. I got to read the book
(17:47):
for some reason. It's weird because like you're a politician,
but like I get in conversations all the time where
people ask me like, are you a socialist or are
you a communist? And I kind of give the same
answer that you did, where it's like I don't know
enough about the ship to claim that I'm in anybody's group,
but I know that the the people that I don't like,
(18:10):
I look at communism and socialism in terms of like
labels the same way that I do as woke. I
don't personally identify as that ship, but like all the
people that I hate seem to not like it, so
I And that actually that makes you think about how
people like identify as like a proud capitalist or whatever
(18:31):
when they work at like radio shack or whatever. It's like,
you don't know, we don't know what capitalism is, do you?
They got no capital, You ain't gotten zero means of production,
my friend. Um, so at least I know that, Like,
I'm not that, not even because I don't want to be.
I just don't have like properties. I'm renting out or
(18:52):
like a factory that people work in, Like I'm literally
not a capitalist in the definition of the term. But
a lot of people don't know what any of these
terms means, and I guess neither did um like the
black laborers and sharecroppers down in Birmingham until like, you know,
I guess, I guess, like the International like Communist Party, like, yo,
(19:17):
it's real rough for black folks down there. We need
to send folks down there to help them out because
it's real bleak and we're trying to get everybody free.
And so a couple of white communists showed up in Birmingham,
and it was a part of like I guess, in
the imagination of like folks that had experienced like the
Civil War, you know, experienced reconstruction, etcetera. There was this
(19:42):
lingering sense that like the Yankees were coming back, like Okay,
the reconstruction failed, but the Yankees are coming back to
like save us and like holding out to that hope.
So when these like white communists showed up, they're like, oh, yeah,
the Yankees are here, so like like help us fighter
for And they didn't give it. They didn't care at all,
(20:02):
like what their political ideology was they were just like Yo,
these people seem ready to throw down. Let's go and
kind of like launch this crazy like this huge movement.
I think I read up there was like twelve thousand
people involved in like these like this coalition of organizations
(20:23):
that came about. The Communist Party organized organizing at the time. Um.
But yeah, who were all the organizations? Um? So there
was like the Sharecroppers Union, Um. The Companist Party itself
had about five people. Chere, copperst Union had up to
twelve thousand. Um. I think the number of trade unions
(20:43):
that got involved in this work of various sizes. Um.
But yeah, altogether they were they was like there was
rolling deep. It was rolling deep. Another thing I wanted
to say on this is like I think that this
that fact of like the people they were like rolled
with the folks who showed to help them, no questions asked,
is like very is very true of politics. Still, um,
(21:06):
there's a lot of like consternation among like white progressives
and athens about why, um, older black folks are so conservative. Sometimes, UM,
I say, sometimes I don't want to pay black voters
into like any kind of box because we're very ideologically diverse.
But we've had this discussion. Yeah, like black is not
(21:27):
the political state, Like, yeah, it's on the political party,
and thank god it's not. It would be worse than
the Democrats because it's like the big tent includes everyone
from your mansion too, you know, very standards or whatever. Right,
but then you can't get anything done. But um, it's
like the well, y'all the well. One of the reasons
of many why like black folks of a like of
(21:49):
a politically powerful classes. It's like they're consider they're very
consistent voting block, they turn out their re election, they
sit on committees, and you know, have all these political connections.
It's because like the folks that have always shown up
around here are the Republicans, and not even out of
a sense of like building deep community relationships or even
(22:11):
caring about people's problems. They've just always been around and
they've always had the power. And if you want power,
those are the people you have to work with. Until
a lot of these folks have been working with Republicans
for like twenty years because they're the only that's the
only shot you have getting anything for the community because
they have all the power. And so those are the
folks they wrote with. Theyre like, O, well, you know,
(22:32):
good old you know buddy, and mcclan stir um has
all he's been in office for twenty years. I know
that guy. He's always been around and so like that's
my homies for no other reason than they're just the
people around. I mean, obviously you're right. I just I
just always think we've got to like caution though, you know,
(22:54):
I never like, I always try not to look at
things in like a class reductionists sort of way, because
at the end of the day, it's like, even if
somebody you know politically is someone you can work with,
I mean, they still require some vetting because they're like
if they don't think like black and brown people are human,
then then the whatever policies that they're talking about don't
(23:17):
include us. That is the thing that ends up blowing
my mind. Though. It's like, so y'all telling me, because
for example, there's dude's reverend in Athens almost ran for
a commission and he gave like two thousand dollars to
Brian Camp at one point, an old black reverend guy.
It's like, you may to tell me, y'all roll with
the casts. I want to literally ban like the stuff
(23:40):
like this history of the stuff you did in the sixties,
marching and stuff. They wouldn't have band us from talking
about that in school. So this is the people we
all roll them went for real. I can't. Yeah, I can't.
I can't. I can't do it. I can't do it.
And I mean, I mean, perhaps I understand the necessity
of it, but there is I do and even if
(24:00):
i'm if I'm being principled about that, it's just like
I can't help somebody achieve their goal as if they're
including me and their goal when they're not. Does that
make sense? Yeah? I mean in this case, talking going
back to depressionary Alabama, I mean these you know, these folks,
whether you were going, you know, agree with their vision
(24:23):
for what the ultimate goal is for their organizing, you know,
a quote unquote money less, class less, stateless society whatever
that is. Um, they did want to give black people free.
They was like real, real, real, real, real real about it. Um.
But I mean one aspect I guess of like recalling
my memory of this book, I don't know to what
(24:45):
degree there was resistance to like you know, oh y'all,
y'all communists like what is you know, perhaps it was
that like um McCarthy ism and stuff and like red
scared so be it s it wasn't really a thing yet.
Um So people weren't as you know, as like I
should be concerned about this. Um as well. I will
(25:07):
say that one of the things that's great about Kelly's
book is that he doesn't try to say that like
communism is good, Like that's for you know, the reader
to think about on their own. It's just like, yo,
this is what happened, Like they went down here and
this is what happened, and like do with this knowledge
what you will. Um So, it's pretty like neutral and
objective if you want to just like learn about a
(25:27):
piece of history that you wouldn't anywhere else because they're
definitely not gonna teach you about this in school, not anymore.
Um so. Man. So you know these white communists they
rolled up in Alabama. They were always devoutly religious and
like only it's kind of able to read and write,
like black labors and share croppers, a couple of handful
(25:51):
of like working class white folks, um and unemployed industrial workers,
you know, housewives, young folks, some renegade liberals and Um,
they just like we're ready to throw down. And what's
really interesting to me, it's like the role of religion
and all this. So these folks, like all these folks
were like the val Christians, right, I believe in Jesus
(26:13):
and redemption. Um. And then when when they started to
roll the idea of salvation into like their organizing on
the ground, they kim to start to kind of believe
that like Russia would come and save them the way
that like Jesus would if anything got to be real bad. Yeah,
(26:34):
it's right, what now? And then get this, So they
blended the teachings of Marx and Lenin in with like
their popular spirituals um into their sermons. And so for example,
they turned a line and give me that old time
religion at the end of the song into if it
was good enough for Lenin, it's good enough for me.
(26:55):
And that's what they were like singing in the churches.
I see. Yeah. And so yeah, it's like merging together
like this this ongoing struggle and resistant struggle, and like
it's rootedness and Christianity and the church just rolling in
the stuff that these cats brought with them down from
New York or wherever and like leaving it like really
(27:17):
tightly into like the existing fabric of their culture. I'm
pretty sure Karl Marx was like really racist. I you
know what, I don't know. I think you're right, though,
I have a feeling I mean not you know, not
even like particulars. I just think he was like, you know,
like obviously of the time. So that's just he was
of the time. Yeah yeah, yeah, but I mean again,
(27:40):
just going to what we were saying, you know, it's
like there the it's just not every obviously, not everything
can be broken down into that class divide because like
you know, I just don't think that un anywhere of
you know, lending or marks list of priorities that they
were thinking. Liberation of people in America. Yeah, yeah, I
(28:02):
mean it's interesting again read the book. I was drawing
a little bit from memory on this. There were some
flashes and struggles between the white and blackbird in the
classes and struggles to bring the white folks and etcetera.
But ultimately it did end up being like a multi
racial movement because while um, well the black folks, I
mean they would get strong, strong up, you know, intreatues
(28:24):
and stuff, white folks couldn't get any sort of like
um relief from the Great Depression, hunger and stuff, and
so was like, oh, yeah, we're actually have in the
same problems out here. You mean to tell me if
we like unite, like we can all get some like
that sound of that kind of spirit. It's also something
who don't want you to know about. But what they
(28:45):
really don't want you to know about is that these
folks believed in armed self defense and don't mean believed
in it, like they were like militant, like militant militant
engaging in what one history called suicidal confrontations with the police,
union busters the clan. They were like not at all
(29:07):
afraid to meet God, Like a lot of a lot
of folks like got killed in gun battles in addition
to like, oh just typical like racist terrorism in the South,
like literally there's rolled up like prepared to die like
in violent war with the police and stuff. Here's a question,
(29:30):
do you think do you think that the religious aspect
of it that they incorporated into it at all might
have helped people get in that sort of like mindset
of like being prepared to Yeah, I mean I'm agagined,
So yeah, I also recently had been watching the new
John Brown TV show, The Good Lord's part that I
(29:52):
would recommend it even Hawk is like pretty bananas in it.
But um, thing like I didn't really understand like the
geosity that kind of underpinned John Brown's like pursuit to
end slavery by any means. Like he was like, you know, slavery,
it's a sin. It's a great like one of the
great sins. Like you know, God has sent me to
(30:15):
like dispatch any slavery and like by any means, like
get people free, like in the name of the Lord, right,
And so, yeah, did you see the there was a
prager you video that they did about who was it?
Was it George Washington? No, it wasn't George. The prigger
(30:38):
You did a video on somebody and they were like
trying to be like, hey, why this person's statue shouldn't
be pulled down or something like that, And they were
giving a list of the different things that they did
that they were trying to say, hey, this Confederate person
did this, and one of the things was they helped
to bring down the John Brown revault. It's like wait
(30:59):
a minute, Yeah, first of all, don't you realize all
slavery ended in America through violence. There was a giant war,
if you may recall, and that's what he was trying
to do, was trying to start a like a ward
in slavery. So maybe we've been sold any other way,
check your check your math there. Probably you I don't
know you. I don't know you trying to stay here, sir,
(31:20):
But yeah, I wonder, I mean, like, um, I wonder too,
the degree to which, like, yo, we're going to heaven
fighting you know, valiantly for like the Lord's will by
like getting out here and getting these gun violes with
the police. How much that inspired their work? And that
then makes me think of like one of the things
that like drove my um like fairly recent disillusionment with
(31:46):
like Christianity was like seeing how folks often are like, well,
you know, it's just a part of God's plan and
there's not nothing anything to do about it. We'll just
like wait around to go to heaven and they'll be
a real lit then, and it's like, bro, like we
can like things don't have to be the way that
they are now. And I wonder if that ship because
(32:07):
like you didn't I don't think you saw that kind
of stuff in like the Civil rights moment. You had
the preachers and the pastors and folks out there with
in the marches. Um. And you don't only see that
too much these days. You've got people like you know,
Reverend um Barber, you know, with a poor People's campaign,
but not you don't only have a huge um national
figures that are of the church that are like, yo,
(32:29):
let's throw down and like in the name of Jesus,
you know what I'm saying. Um, I don't know, I
want to do a whole episode on that, because I
think the phenomenon is a bit super interesting. Um. I
mean because like if that if you know that, definitely
that definitely does seem to be like kind of the
attitude that ship is, like ship morphed into kind of
(32:53):
like you know, like pray thoughts and prayers, thoughts and prayer. Yeah.
And I don't want to paint this with the two
broader brush because we're all in a time where it
like movements are very decentralized. We don't have a Martin
Luther King Jr. In general. Um. And so that's not
to like say this is typical of all churches everywhere,
just because there isn't like a national leader that captivates
(33:14):
our imagination the way that like Imalkay did in his time.
But I mean that's just what I've seen a lot
of times, and so it's so so cable the opposite
in the way they went. These folks went into it.
They were like, yo, if today is the day I
meet the Lord, I'm about it, Like we're coming for
these you know, these landlords that evicted so and so
(33:35):
and just going out guns blazon. It's so strange. But yeah,
I should totally come back and do a whole whole
episode on that, yeah, because I mean I don't even know.
I don't know we're gonna get to it here, but
I mean, you know, the soul civil rights aspect of
Birmingham as well, you could have it. We could have
a whole episode on that ship. Yeah, oh no, that's
(33:58):
so so much Sean cover. And then we'll get to
sort of like at least want to get to today
kind of talking about like how all this lay the
groundwork for the civil rights movement in ways they will
never tell you about, um, but like so they're out
here like with rifles and stuff, just like gun battling
(34:19):
the racists. Do you have any examples of like, like
a confrontation at all? I wish I did. I don't
have one off the top of my head, unfortunately. Yeah,
but that's another thing. We get some stories on that.
I wonder if we if we mentioned some of those standoffs.
Oh man, yeah, Um damn, I wish I would have. Yeah,
(34:42):
gone back and we read the book, because because that's
the thing that blew my mind. It's like the descriptions
of the throwdowns in the book. I'm just like, they did,
excuse me, they did what? And then get this that
they were doing all this. We're like, um, fairly reasonable things,
better well welfare policies for the hunger stricken, destitute, you
(35:05):
know bottom, you know, bottom of the bottom of the
bottom folks, and the depression era, better treatment for workers,
basic civil rights. They're fighting for the right to vote,
right to sit on jury's, you know, right to not
get jim crowed. Effectively, depression. This is a a depression erea.
So they were out here just a meeting people's basic
needs for food, water, and shelter. If someone's water got
(35:26):
turned off, comedies probably would figure out a way to
turn the water back on. If electricity got turned off,
they able to come and use jemper cables to run electricity.
And if someone got evicted from their home, they would
roll up to the landlord and be like, look, you
have a choice. You need to put that family back
in their house or yours might not be there tomorrow,
(35:49):
and like just yeah, just to give people a sense
of like the timeline and ship like that, like any
sort of like real civil rights discussion was at least
like twenty years away from this point were doing that. UM.
So yeah, I mean they just wanted we want some
kind of work or want somewhere other support for the government. Um.
(36:12):
But then another like animating issue for them was the
Scottsboro case. Nine young black men were also arrested for
raping t white women and they end up going to jail.
And so this is a tie into the soil of
Rights movement because apparently Rosa Parks attended some of their
leadings around the Scottsboro case UM, and as well some
(36:37):
of these um we'll come back to the second UM.
But this was like a central place where they had
a lot of tension with the Double A CP down
there at the time. So I don't even mentioned earlier
that UM like when a CP rolled up in Birmingham,
the Double a CP. So when UM the Commonist Party
(36:59):
are arrived in Birmingham, the Double A CP of Birmingham
and all over the surrounding county had six Jews paying
members like they were like gasping for air, like not
even UM. So there's just there's so much sh unpack here. Unfortunately,
we're gonna have to come back to it. Well, I
guess fortunately I'm gonna come back to it in an
(37:20):
upcoming episode. We have a lot of great guests coming
up in the next couple of weeks, too, very excited
for what's the store for waiting on reparations, including this
new single then Matt has put out this week called
should Not Be Multiplied. Let's spend a little bit of
that to take us out this week. I don't yo,
(37:47):
rappers want to battle, but they just ain't got the AMMO.
Keep my mouth alow on the microphone like it's the
camel toll was hand me Yo. When a rabbit flow,
it is quite mechanical. It's like a caddle. Turn the
MC to a fan of go damnage broke. It got
them talking with a man to ball my Spanish plug.
Cut your fucking neck and let the hammer blow when
it comes. I hit you with that false niggas can
(38:09):
of post. Niggas ain't on my team, so fucking little
and a million dollars you ain't that really tough for
neck bit reaction every ran and silly stop sn open
hand slap. Boy, You can't just really blow? Have you
ever consent? It's a chance he really Sueah, you just man,
because I'm the standing bear. Can't be fair band and
(38:29):
all you're standing fair? Come funk with your man right here.
You ain't gotta take my word. Hurt the ship with
chandelier and with the ships. The reason that the witnesses
just can't appeal. All I got is trying to get
a stash. All I got his emptys in my way
in the prophets of my past. Also I got some
pocket full of cash. I don't even think that none
of this is skint of matter, sins who I just
(38:51):
want to wrap. I just want to wrap it. Just
easy to knock us all off the map. Nigger. I
just want to rap and maybe get a pocket for
the cash. But I don't even think it shouldn't matter.
When I'm rapping in the kids, fool, I'm trying to
let the world know I even got the grip to
pimping in the fur color gets you with the pix
(39:11):
too while I'm simping. But low, get upuff my dick food.
You probably call your girl bro knife. I wonder I'm
rob when I'm in slumber. My mama woo my ass
and my music. I hot it from her. I bury
these wrappers, not in the casting, but lying under the cat,
spraying out more loads and the Bryan Pappa. It's that
MPC food. It's made for a boom box. These motherfucker's
(39:33):
spinning like the wrappers and boom docks. The wrist taker
reaching your mouth like grip Baker, rip your fucking jar
out if it means I'm gonna get paper, yo, all
I got is trying to get a stash. All I
got his emptys in my way in the prophets of
my cast. Also, I got some pocket full of cash.
I don't even think that none of this kind of matter. See,
(39:54):
I just want to wrap. I just want to wrap it.
Just some me disease and knock as all the map nigger.
I just want to wrap and maybe get a pocket
for the cash. But I don't even think you shouldn't matter,
you just want to wrap. Listen to Waiting on Reparations
on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever
(40:15):
you get your podcasts.
Uh, we're waiting on reparations. Uh uh dis the history book.
So let me tell you the tailor featt Labina Communist
part of the deprection era, TIY getting scared off for
the sheriffs and share cropping for bear from the black folks.
Parado with the fair forms. You came and said, I folks,
they try to turn your lights off or to not you.
(00:24):
Right the book we run up on the move rightful
to live, susicidal, but the black folks was kind of weird.
They couldn't really read. But they consist of him too.
Then and then this alliance and red and black and
the white would later lay the frame before the fights
of Rosa Parks and Aye Davis. So when they say
that it's boxing gets the grave and punch of racist historically,
the kind of holds up. Actually, you're listening to waiting
on reparation, the production of Iheartard, good morning or afternoon
(00:52):
or pending on when you're listening to this. If you're
listening to this when it just came out, then happy St.
Patrick's Day, yeah, or if or if it's after that, Um,
take some baby profen, you'll drink some waters. Um calling
calling to work calling sick. I don't need you, It wouldn't.
(01:15):
I mean maybe if you're like a school crossing guard
for like an elementary school, maybe don't call out the
children needs you. But I mean otherwise who cares. Very fine.
I think everybody's definitely gonna take notice of the subdued
intro this morning, I know why the hell I'm tired?
(01:37):
What why are you? So? I am in Waco, Texas
this morning? Your drove to Waco. So yeah, see what
happened was see what had happened was, um, I'm gonna
go to the south by Southwest UM. And we had
a show in Birmingham and Saturday in Birmingham a couple
of days. Decided to talk to you all about some
(01:59):
of that, um you know which has inspired this week's episode.
So Young a Bremenham for a couple of days, which
worked my interest in doing this show. But um, you know,
our hope to drive about halfway and stop was shattered
when we got to the hotel that we had booked
(02:20):
um online and it was not only mad sketchy, it
was so sketchy that we rolled up to check in
and they were like, oh yeah, we don't accept the
electronic payment. I was like, what do you mean I
paid online for Then they were like, nah, it doesn't count,
it doesn't count. So I'm pretty sure these I'm pretty
sure these cats just took my money and just you
(02:41):
wouldn't give us a room. And so, man, there's just
so much to unpack about everywhere we've been so far.
But ultimately we like tried to find hotels like, you know,
an hour out, two hours out, and finally we're just like, yo, look, Paul,
grandma lives in Wago. We make it a way goo good.
(03:03):
Oh no, no, no, it's just me as holm with
you know, Grandma, etcetera. But um, so we ended up driving,
you know, we might to drive like six hours. I
ended up being Mark Elevan, So my voice may sound
a bit scrutchy, and I may seeund a bit tired
because that happened. But I mean, along the way, a
lot of really dopeness has transpired. So part of why
(03:27):
getting here took us along because we stopped for three
hours in jack Mississippi and had lunch with Jerry Mitchell.
Are you feeling with Jerry Mitchell's Jerry Mitchell is the
investigative reporter that solved the unsolved murders of Mega Everts
and of the case of the Birmingham church bombings and
(03:50):
a number of other like civil rights cold cases. Yeah,
and so like this was the dude that put a
bunch of klansmen in jail for like murdering civil rights heroes.
So yeah, there was a there was a movie about
the trial for like the killer of Betyar Everest called
The Ghost of Mississippi with Alec Baldwin and Woopy Goldberg
(04:16):
and James Would I believe, But I wonder, I can't remember.
I wonder who played that reporter that because I'm sure
he would have to have been a character that I
gotta look it up. And also he was super cool
and nice. I would love to have him on the
show to talk about his work. Um as well. In Birmingham,
we had the opportunity to hang out with Isaiah Thomas,
that one of the lee organizers of the Amazon unionization
(04:40):
effort twenty years old Ball of Lightning, Like I thought
you meant the Isaiah Thomas, I'm sorry, no, no, no, no,
no no. Was cool. So lots of interesting Birmingham history uncovered,
and of course in this trip that I would love
us to you know, touch on in like a multiply
(05:01):
MultiPark series on the city, because yeah, I think that's
an awesome idea of I mean, just from the stuff
that we got for today, it's it's definitely a rich
history that you can really dig into. Birmingham is a
wild place, has been, perhaps always will be. I've only
(05:22):
been I've only been to Birmingham once. I think it
was to do like a it's like secret Stages or something.
Oh yeah, wait so we um we played the Syndicate
Lounge for this hip hop series called The Bottom Mix.
Actually hung out with Brish. Yeah. So um, rich history,
rich music scene, that lots to cover. So today we're
(05:44):
going to dig on into some lesser known history um
of Birmingham. We'll see what we'll see what we get
there a month to return to the topic because there's
so much to say. But you're about to get out
on the road yourself. It was my understanding. Yeah, just
doing like a short little run. I'm doing some St.
Patty's show tomorrow and then I'm doing something else in
(06:07):
North Carolina the day after that. So it's just gonna
be you know, a traveling weekend and I'm also um
coming out with a new there's a new EP that
I was dropping with an Atlanta producer named Josiah Soren.
But it's like a low fi, jazzy sort of thing.
It's just like, you know, three songs. But we've we've
(06:27):
been cutting the video and it's like running down to
the wire. So it's like in between the podcast and
the video then having to go out of town this
and then our city in Savannah. Savannah has last time
I checked, I think like the third or fourth biggest St.
Patrick's Day like celebration, I guess in the country here. Yeah,
(06:49):
it's weird, right, but like we're about to have an
influx of like two hundred thousand people. Yeah, so it's
it's about to be crazy here. Where to park, It's
it's it's everything's whack, and you know, it's just been
a hectic week. So we don't want to we don't
want a front. Our aesthetic is is you know, we
(07:10):
can real low five boom bad. This is going to
be very much in the spirit of those you know,
MF Doom transitions between anime cartoons at one AM, where
it's kind of like hazy, laid back. Yeah, as we
get into some less of known history of the city
of Birmingham. Event all right, we'll be with that after
(07:31):
the jump. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, we are back. So
you have this adventure in Birmingham. Where do you want
to start as far as like the history or something
(07:54):
about it that not too many people know about. So,
I mean I would characterize this as like quote unquote
all the way act. But and thinking about that, I
imagine there's even while their history even farther back than
you know here, the Great Depression era, um, if we
get into slave re abolition, indigenous folks, etcetera. But I
did want to start out talking about this era because
(08:16):
it is well documented in Robin D. G. Kelly's book
Hammer and Hoe, from which we take the title of
this episode. Um. So while we're talking about the Depression era,
I wanted to also capture this as a part of
a larger tendency in the media to sort of just
like forget about the South, like we like, despite the
fact we have this very rich history of liberation struggle,
(08:39):
um against the oppressive forces that are perhaps you know,
more visible, particularly brutal. You still see like coastal liberals
like making fun of the South every time Republicans like
are awful. I think ab how like in Georgia, like UM,
voter suppression bills raised calls to boycott the states outside
(09:00):
of the the state, even though like nobody in the state
wanted that. Um. I think about people joking that like
in Texas, Kentucky, like all these survivors of like weather
disasters deserve their state's horrible relief responses because quote unquote
like they voted for their leaders despite the fact that
like majorities of people don't vote at all. So let's
(09:22):
you know, not even talk about that. I guess here
then again, you know, I'm back in our own state
once and once more thinking about how many progressives, um
and leftists we had elected to various levels of government. Um.
When you hear about like successful left electoral projects, you
think about New York, or you hear about it in Nevada.
But they ain't gotta love, they ain't gonna love people
(09:45):
in the in the South fighting for their freedom. So
I think Germingham is a great example of history that
goes untold. Okay, So just because you you brought that
up in terms of like, you know, the like you said,
the liberal like thing of like, oh, let's boycott the
state or business businesses should pull out of the state
(10:05):
because of something they're doing. What's what is like another
UM effective I guess like political like repercussion or punishment
that you can do when some of these gerrymander Georgia
legislatures like do wild shit that's not really in tune
with the rest of the countrys something you can do
(10:27):
to affect the officials or to affect the government that
instilled that. Since you said, like a lot of the
population doesn't vote and there's people there who have that
will be affected by like boycotts and stuff, yeah, I
mean send resources to organizations that are organizing in the
state that are doing voter registration and voter education and
a voter turnout efforts, etcetera. Because like, yeah, boycott's hurt
(10:51):
working people. I mean, if the working people call for
it and they're like down for that, then desk what's up?
In this case, A lot of folks that UM are
part of who have been drawn Georgia by like the
expanding film industry, are folks that vote Democrat, and those
are folks that are going to be harmed by a
boycott and I'd be like, well, you guys, I got
to move back to California because, like you know, the
(11:14):
movie sets shut down because no one wanted to do
business here anymore, actually further cementing Republican power in this state.
But like, yo, if you you know, take that, if
you know, if you want to do a little boycott, fine,
um you know, like, oh, I'm not gonna buy Coca
Cola because they gave fifty grand to like the author
of the Senate bill making it illegal to hand out
(11:35):
water in voting lines or whatever. You know, all right,
take the twenty bucks and give it to like um
UM Asian American's Advancing Justice or UM put their Latino
X which they you know, get out the vote for,
you know, in Hispanic community or something. Because then actually
you're you're fighting the problem by helping people, the people
fighting the problem fight the problem. You know what I'm saying,
(11:57):
I feel I feel conflicted about it, because I mean,
on one hand, I definitely hear what you're saying, and
I mean I agree with it, But then there's just
like another part of it where it's like, what can
you do to these big entities other than hurt their pockets?
I mean at the end of the day, and it's
unfortunately the ship has trickled down because of the way
everything is tied up together. But like when we were
(12:18):
talking about the NFL a couple of weeks ago, you know,
that's the only about the easiest way to get that
to happen would be to boycott the NFL for them
to lose money because of it, And that would not
only affect the billionaires, but it would probably affect a
lot of low level people worse than it would affect
the billionaires. But that would be something tangible of like
(12:39):
over losing viewership or losing money. People are buying jerseys anymore. Okay,
they're upset because of what. All, right, let's change that.
But when you're doing that against actively against the wishes
of the people who are doing the work in the state,
like what, why why would you do that? Like literally,
I was getting arguments with people not in Georgia about
the boycott in Georgia and trying to be like no,
(13:00):
like I lived here, Like I know what I'm talking about,
Like no one is asked for this. I appreciate your intent,
and people even being condescending in that regard as well.
Like well, you know, shut out whatever, like just being
so insistent that they want to do things the way
they want to do things, even if though they have
no inside knowledge of what is happening and are just
(13:23):
so and so self consistent and just like blaantly disrespecting
like what people are actually asking for that are in
these impacted communities, um and have been doing this organizing
for a long time. So that's the thing. I mean,
you're absolutely right that hitting them in their pockets is effective.
But like if that's like if you're just going over
like over and around what people are actually asking you
(13:45):
to do, like it's not actually about the issue for you,
it's about being on some kind of moral high horse
and like an eco trend. Okay, you know, I don't
want to get this is again, this is why you,
like you said, this episode is an union of discussions.
I don't want to get two bogged out in any
one topic. But oh yeah, let's keep it rolling. Definitely,
I definitely thought of an addition to that. But okay,
(14:06):
we can we can come back to this if we
have to save this snippet for something else. But anyway, so,
um so, yeah, people, people forget about the South, they're like, oh,
you know, they've been bes Bridge and like the Freedom Writers.
But like, um, especially with like the CRT bands trying
to happen, you're certainly not going to hear about some
(14:26):
of this kind of stuff. I mean, you can't even
hear about like traditional civil rights history, let alone like, um,
some of the stuff I'm goot to tell you about
today obscure esoteric, like yeah, yeah, okay. So, um So,
this book that I referenced Robin D. G. Kelly is
Hammer and How is a history of the Alabama Communist
(14:48):
movement during the Great Depression. And let me just sell
you it is a completely and totally wild read. Um, Like,
I just it's really it's going to be very hard
for me to capture because my mind was just excuse
me what? Um So? In it, Kelly describes the way
that black workers um brought existing traditions of resistance to
(15:09):
racial depression into development of a unique version of Marxism,
and how the Communist Party came to attract a substantial
number of um, African American workers in Alabama, so like
fight for like, you know, struggles that we typically think
of in a Great Depression. Eary of you know, getting
welfare and you know, just the means to survive when
(15:31):
that somebody could put out of work obviously, the right
to vote, just fighting racial terrorism by the clan and
the police, etcetera. Um, And so we think of it,
it's just like oh that type of silver right struggle.
But like in Birmingham during the Great Depression, like the
folks that were like about that life are real for real.
We're like straight up like communists apparently like straight like
(15:55):
not like the we're just going to call you communists
because no exactly. And speaking of that, I want to
go ahead and give this caveat, I mean regouts caveat
as much as it's just like something I've been thinking
about lately because I've been waiting for the day that
someone tries to ask me if I'm a communist because
that's like the scary like and I've been thinking about
it because I'm not. But I'm like, Okay, the answer
(16:19):
I think it's legitimately is that I'm not because I
don't even think I know what communism really is, and
neither does anyone. Most most anyone that would ask either
of us that question, like doesn't know what it is either. Um, essentially,
I'm sorry, I said no, no, no no, I mean, I'm
just I was going to add to that as is
I feel the same way. It's like, I'm not but
(16:43):
I don't go ahead. I'll finish with my thought after you, okay.
I will say that I am vaguely familiar with it
as an idea I guess as like moneyless, classless, stateless society.
But I literally don't even know what that means either,
Like it's just really hard to imagine. So I would
essentially say that I I'm kind of too down to
be a communist. There's a lot of big books you
(17:03):
got to read and stuff. I hear. It seems I
don't know, it's some kind of that's from like a
theory sort of more scholarly standpoint, I guess, because there's
got to be like a more what's the word, There
has to be a more like proletariat understanding because into
(17:25):
it's not like, hey, I have to read some fucking
gigantic book of theory by seven different Russian dudes. That's
a good point because these cats down here in the
Great Depression era, like they couldn't read a lot of
them exactly. So now I'm like wait a second, how
do they How did they get so into this stuff?
Like I don't know. I got to read the book
(17:47):
for some reason. It's weird because like you're a politician,
but like I get in conversations all the time where
people ask me like, are you a socialist or are
you a communist? And I kind of give the same
answer that you did, where it's like I don't know
enough about the ship to claim that I'm in anybody's group,
but I know that the the people that I don't like,
(18:10):
I look at communism and socialism in terms of like
labels the same way that I do as woke. I
don't personally identify as that ship, but like all the
people that I hate seem to not like it, so
I And that actually that makes you think about how
people like identify as like a proud capitalist or whatever
(18:31):
when they work at like radio shack or whatever. It's like,
you don't know, we don't know what capitalism is, do you?
They got no capital, You ain't gotten zero means of production,
my friend. Um, so at least I know that, Like,
I'm not that, not even because I don't want to be.
I just don't have like properties. I'm renting out or
(18:52):
like a factory that people work in, Like I'm literally
not a capitalist in the definition of the term. But
a lot of people don't know what any of these
terms means, and I guess neither did um like the
black laborers and sharecroppers down in Birmingham until like, you know,
I guess, I guess, like the International like Communist Party, like, yo,
(19:17):
it's real rough for black folks down there. We need
to send folks down there to help them out because
it's real bleak and we're trying to get everybody free.
And so a couple of white communists showed up in Birmingham,
and it was a part of like I guess, in
the imagination of like folks that had experienced like the
Civil War, you know, experienced reconstruction, etcetera. There was this
(19:42):
lingering sense that like the Yankees were coming back, like Okay,
the reconstruction failed, but the Yankees are coming back to
like save us and like holding out to that hope.
So when these like white communists showed up, they're like, oh, yeah,
the Yankees are here, so like like help us fighter
for And they didn't give it. They didn't care at all,
(20:02):
like what their political ideology was they were just like Yo,
these people seem ready to throw down. Let's go and
kind of like launch this crazy like this huge movement.
I think I read up there was like twelve thousand
people involved in like these like this coalition of organizations
(20:23):
that came about. The Communist Party organized organizing at the time. Um.
But yeah, who were all the organizations? Um? So there
was like the Sharecroppers Union, Um. The Companist Party itself
had about five people. Chere, copperst Union had up to
twelve thousand. Um. I think the number of trade unions
(20:43):
that got involved in this work of various sizes. Um.
But yeah, altogether they were they was like there was
rolling deep. It was rolling deep. Another thing I wanted
to say on this is like I think that this
that fact of like the people they were like rolled
with the folks who showed to help them, no questions asked,
is like very is very true of politics. Still, um,
(21:06):
there's a lot of like consternation among like white progressives
and athens about why, um, older black folks are so conservative. Sometimes, UM,
I say, sometimes I don't want to pay black voters
into like any kind of box because we're very ideologically diverse.
But we've had this discussion. Yeah, like black is not
(21:27):
the political state, Like, yeah, it's on the political party,
and thank god it's not. It would be worse than
the Democrats because it's like the big tent includes everyone
from your mansion too, you know, very standards or whatever. Right,
but then you can't get anything done. But um, it's
like the well, y'all the well. One of the reasons
of many why like black folks of a like of
(21:49):
a politically powerful classes. It's like they're consider they're very
consistent voting block, they turn out their re election, they
sit on committees, and you know, have all these political connections.
It's because like the folks that have always shown up
around here are the Republicans, and not even out of
a sense of like building deep community relationships or even
(22:11):
caring about people's problems. They've just always been around and
they've always had the power. And if you want power,
those are the people you have to work with. Until
a lot of these folks have been working with Republicans
for like twenty years because they're the only that's the
only shot you have getting anything for the community because
they have all the power. And so those are the
folks they wrote with. Theyre like, O, well, you know,
(22:32):
good old you know buddy, and mcclan stir um has
all he's been in office for twenty years. I know
that guy. He's always been around and so like that's
my homies for no other reason than they're just the
people around. I mean, obviously you're right. I just I
just always think we've got to like caution though, you know,
(22:54):
I never like, I always try not to look at
things in like a class reductionists sort of way, because
at the end of the day, it's like, even if
somebody you know politically is someone you can work with,
I mean, they still require some vetting because they're like
if they don't think like black and brown people are human,
then then the whatever policies that they're talking about don't
(23:17):
include us. That is the thing that ends up blowing
my mind. Though. It's like, so y'all telling me, because
for example, there's dude's reverend in Athens almost ran for
a commission and he gave like two thousand dollars to
Brian Camp at one point, an old black reverend guy.
It's like, you may to tell me, y'all roll with
the casts. I want to literally ban like the stuff
(23:40):
like this history of the stuff you did in the sixties,
marching and stuff. They wouldn't have band us from talking
about that in school. So this is the people we
all roll them went for real. I can't. Yeah, I can't.
I can't. I can't do it. I can't do it.
And I mean, I mean, perhaps I understand the necessity
of it, but there is I do and even if
(24:00):
i'm if I'm being principled about that, it's just like
I can't help somebody achieve their goal as if they're
including me and their goal when they're not. Does that
make sense? Yeah? I mean in this case, talking going
back to depressionary Alabama, I mean these you know, these folks,
whether you were going, you know, agree with their vision
(24:23):
for what the ultimate goal is for their organizing, you know,
a quote unquote money less, class less, stateless society whatever
that is. Um, they did want to give black people free.
They was like real, real, real, real, real real about it. Um.
But I mean one aspect I guess of like recalling
my memory of this book, I don't know to what
(24:45):
degree there was resistance to like you know, oh y'all,
y'all communists like what is you know, perhaps it was
that like um McCarthy ism and stuff and like red
scared so be it s it wasn't really a thing yet.
Um So people weren't as you know, as like I
should be concerned about this. Um as well. I will
(25:07):
say that one of the things that's great about Kelly's
book is that he doesn't try to say that like
communism is good, Like that's for you know, the reader
to think about on their own. It's just like, yo,
this is what happened, Like they went down here and
this is what happened, and like do with this knowledge
what you will. Um So, it's pretty like neutral and
objective if you want to just like learn about a
(25:27):
piece of history that you wouldn't anywhere else because they're
definitely not gonna teach you about this in school, not anymore.
Um so. Man. So you know these white communists they
rolled up in Alabama. They were always devoutly religious and
like only it's kind of able to read and write,
like black labors and share croppers, a couple of handful
(25:51):
of like working class white folks, um and unemployed industrial workers,
you know, housewives, young folks, some renegade liberals and Um,
they just like we're ready to throw down. And what's
really interesting to me, it's like the role of religion
and all this. So these folks, like all these folks
were like the val Christians, right, I believe in Jesus
(26:13):
and redemption. Um. And then when when they started to
roll the idea of salvation into like their organizing on
the ground, they kim to start to kind of believe
that like Russia would come and save them the way
that like Jesus would if anything got to be real bad. Yeah,
(26:34):
it's right, what now? And then get this, So they
blended the teachings of Marx and Lenin in with like
their popular spirituals um into their sermons. And so for example,
they turned a line and give me that old time
religion at the end of the song into if it
was good enough for Lenin, it's good enough for me.
(26:55):
And that's what they were like singing in the churches.
I see. Yeah. And so yeah, it's like merging together
like this this ongoing struggle and resistant struggle, and like
it's rootedness and Christianity and the church just rolling in
the stuff that these cats brought with them down from
New York or wherever and like leaving it like really
(27:17):
tightly into like the existing fabric of their culture. I'm
pretty sure Karl Marx was like really racist. I you
know what, I don't know. I think you're right, though,
I have a feeling I mean not you know, not
even like particulars. I just think he was like, you know,
like obviously of the time. So that's just he was
of the time. Yeah yeah, yeah, but I mean again,
(27:40):
just going to what we were saying, you know, it's
like there the it's just not every obviously, not everything
can be broken down into that class divide because like
you know, I just don't think that un anywhere of
you know, lending or marks list of priorities that they
were thinking. Liberation of people in America. Yeah, yeah, I
(28:02):
mean it's interesting again read the book. I was drawing
a little bit from memory on this. There were some
flashes and struggles between the white and blackbird in the
classes and struggles to bring the white folks and etcetera.
But ultimately it did end up being like a multi
racial movement because while um, well the black folks, I
mean they would get strong, strong up, you know, intreatues
(28:24):
and stuff, white folks couldn't get any sort of like
um relief from the Great Depression, hunger and stuff, and
so was like, oh, yeah, we're actually have in the
same problems out here. You mean to tell me if
we like unite, like we can all get some like
that sound of that kind of spirit. It's also something
who don't want you to know about. But what they
(28:45):
really don't want you to know about is that these
folks believed in armed self defense and don't mean believed
in it, like they were like militant, like militant militant
engaging in what one history called suicidal confrontations with the police,
union busters the clan. They were like not at all
(29:07):
afraid to meet God, Like a lot of a lot
of folks like got killed in gun battles in addition
to like, oh just typical like racist terrorism in the South,
like literally there's rolled up like prepared to die like
in violent war with the police and stuff. Here's a question,
(29:30):
do you think do you think that the religious aspect
of it that they incorporated into it at all might
have helped people get in that sort of like mindset
of like being prepared to Yeah, I mean I'm agagined,
So yeah, I also recently had been watching the new
John Brown TV show, The Good Lord's part that I
(29:52):
would recommend it even Hawk is like pretty bananas in it.
But um, thing like I didn't really understand like the
geosity that kind of underpinned John Brown's like pursuit to
end slavery by any means. Like he was like, you know, slavery,
it's a sin. It's a great like one of the
great sins. Like you know, God has sent me to
(30:15):
like dispatch any slavery and like by any means, like
get people free, like in the name of the Lord, right,
And so, yeah, did you see the there was a
prager you video that they did about who was it?
Was it George Washington? No, it wasn't George. The prigger
(30:38):
You did a video on somebody and they were like
trying to be like, hey, why this person's statue shouldn't
be pulled down or something like that, And they were
giving a list of the different things that they did
that they were trying to say, hey, this Confederate person
did this, and one of the things was they helped
to bring down the John Brown revault. It's like wait
(30:59):
a minute, Yeah, first of all, don't you realize all
slavery ended in America through violence. There was a giant war,
if you may recall, and that's what he was trying
to do, was trying to start a like a ward
in slavery. So maybe we've been sold any other way,
check your check your math there. Probably you I don't
know you. I don't know you trying to stay here, sir,
(31:20):
But yeah, I wonder, I mean, like, um, I wonder too,
the degree to which, like, yo, we're going to heaven
fighting you know, valiantly for like the Lord's will by
like getting out here and getting these gun violes with
the police. How much that inspired their work? And that
then makes me think of like one of the things
that like drove my um like fairly recent disillusionment with
(31:46):
like Christianity was like seeing how folks often are like, well,
you know, it's just a part of God's plan and
there's not nothing anything to do about it. We'll just
like wait around to go to heaven and they'll be
a real lit then, and it's like, bro, like we
can like things don't have to be the way that
they are now. And I wonder if that ship because
(32:07):
like you didn't I don't think you saw that kind
of stuff in like the Civil rights moment. You had
the preachers and the pastors and folks out there with
in the marches. Um. And you don't only see that
too much these days. You've got people like you know,
Reverend um Barber, you know, with a poor People's campaign,
but not you don't only have a huge um national
figures that are of the church that are like, yo,
(32:29):
let's throw down and like in the name of Jesus,
you know what I'm saying. Um, I don't know, I
want to do a whole episode on that, because I
think the phenomenon is a bit super interesting. Um. I
mean because like if that if you know that, definitely
that definitely does seem to be like kind of the
attitude that ship is, like ship morphed into kind of
(32:53):
like you know, like pray thoughts and prayers, thoughts and prayer. Yeah.
And I don't want to paint this with the two
broader brush because we're all in a time where it
like movements are very decentralized. We don't have a Martin
Luther King Jr. In general. Um. And so that's not
to like say this is typical of all churches everywhere,
just because there isn't like a national leader that captivates
(33:14):
our imagination the way that like Imalkay did in his time.
But I mean that's just what I've seen a lot
of times, and so it's so so cable the opposite
in the way they went. These folks went into it.
They were like, yo, if today is the day I
meet the Lord, I'm about it, Like we're coming for
these you know, these landlords that evicted so and so
(33:35):
and just going out guns blazon. It's so strange. But yeah,
I should totally come back and do a whole whole
episode on that, yeah, because I mean I don't even know.
I don't know we're gonna get to it here, but
I mean, you know, the soul civil rights aspect of
Birmingham as well, you could have it. We could have
a whole episode on that ship. Yeah, oh no, that's
(33:58):
so so much Sean cover. And then we'll get to
sort of like at least want to get to today
kind of talking about like how all this lay the
groundwork for the civil rights movement in ways they will
never tell you about, um, but like so they're out
here like with rifles and stuff, just like gun battling
(34:19):
the racists. Do you have any examples of like, like
a confrontation at all? I wish I did. I don't
have one off the top of my head, unfortunately. Yeah,
but that's another thing. We get some stories on that.
I wonder if we if we mentioned some of those standoffs.
Oh man, yeah, Um damn, I wish I would have. Yeah,
(34:42):
gone back and we read the book, because because that's
the thing that blew my mind. It's like the descriptions
of the throwdowns in the book. I'm just like, they did,
excuse me, they did what? And then get this that
they were doing all this. We're like, um, fairly reasonable things,
better well welfare policies for the hunger stricken, destitute, you
(35:05):
know bottom, you know, bottom of the bottom of the
bottom folks, and the depression era, better treatment for workers,
basic civil rights. They're fighting for the right to vote,
right to sit on jury's, you know, right to not
get jim crowed. Effectively, depression. This is a a depression erea.
So they were out here just a meeting people's basic
needs for food, water, and shelter. If someone's water got
(35:26):
turned off, comedies probably would figure out a way to
turn the water back on. If electricity got turned off,
they able to come and use jemper cables to run electricity.
And if someone got evicted from their home, they would
roll up to the landlord and be like, look, you
have a choice. You need to put that family back
in their house or yours might not be there tomorrow,
(35:49):
and like just yeah, just to give people a sense
of like the timeline and ship like that, like any
sort of like real civil rights discussion was at least
like twenty years away from this point were doing that. UM.
So yeah, I mean they just wanted we want some
kind of work or want somewhere other support for the government. Um.
(36:12):
But then another like animating issue for them was the
Scottsboro case. Nine young black men were also arrested for
raping t white women and they end up going to jail.
And so this is a tie into the soil of
Rights movement because apparently Rosa Parks attended some of their
leadings around the Scottsboro case UM, and as well some
(36:37):
of these um we'll come back to the second UM.
But this was like a central place where they had
a lot of tension with the Double A CP down
there at the time. So I don't even mentioned earlier
that UM like when a CP rolled up in Birmingham,
the Double a CP. So when UM the Commonist Party
(36:59):
are arrived in Birmingham, the Double A CP of Birmingham
and all over the surrounding county had six Jews paying
members like they were like gasping for air, like not
even UM. So there's just there's so much sh unpack here. Unfortunately,
we're gonna have to come back to it. Well, I
guess fortunately I'm gonna come back to it in an
(37:20):
upcoming episode. We have a lot of great guests coming
up in the next couple of weeks, too, very excited
for what's the store for waiting on reparations, including this
new single then Matt has put out this week called
should Not Be Multiplied. Let's spend a little bit of
that to take us out this week. I don't yo,
(37:47):
rappers want to battle, but they just ain't got the AMMO.
Keep my mouth alow on the microphone like it's the
camel toll was hand me Yo. When a rabbit flow,
it is quite mechanical. It's like a caddle. Turn the
MC to a fan of go damnage broke. It got
them talking with a man to ball my Spanish plug.
Cut your fucking neck and let the hammer blow when
it comes. I hit you with that false niggas can
(38:09):
of post. Niggas ain't on my team, so fucking little
and a million dollars you ain't that really tough for
neck bit reaction every ran and silly stop sn open
hand slap. Boy, You can't just really blow? Have you
ever consent? It's a chance he really Sueah, you just man,
because I'm the standing bear. Can't be fair band and
(38:29):
all you're standing fair? Come funk with your man right here.
You ain't gotta take my word. Hurt the ship with
chandelier and with the ships. The reason that the witnesses
just can't appeal. All I got is trying to get
a stash. All I got his emptys in my way
in the prophets of my past. Also I got some
pocket full of cash. I don't even think that none
of this is skint of matter, sins who I just
(38:51):
want to wrap. I just want to wrap it. Just
easy to knock us all off the map. Nigger. I
just want to rap and maybe get a pocket for
the cash. But I don't even think it shouldn't matter.
When I'm rapping in the kids, fool, I'm trying to
let the world know I even got the grip to
pimping in the fur color gets you with the pix
(39:11):
too while I'm simping. But low, get upuff my dick food.
You probably call your girl bro knife. I wonder I'm
rob when I'm in slumber. My mama woo my ass
and my music. I hot it from her. I bury
these wrappers, not in the casting, but lying under the cat,
spraying out more loads and the Bryan Pappa. It's that
MPC food. It's made for a boom box. These motherfucker's
(39:33):
spinning like the wrappers and boom docks. The wrist taker
reaching your mouth like grip Baker, rip your fucking jar
out if it means I'm gonna get paper, yo, all
I got is trying to get a stash. All I
got his emptys in my way in the prophets of
my cast. Also, I got some pocket full of cash.
I don't even think that none of this kind of matter. See,
(39:54):
I just want to wrap. I just want to wrap it.
Just some me disease and knock as all the map nigger.
I just want to wrap and maybe get a pocket
for the cash. But I don't even think you shouldn't matter,
you just want to wrap. Listen to Waiting on Reparations
on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever
(40:15):
you get your podcasts.
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