Introducing 'We're Having a Moment'

It's true. We all feel it in the United States. We are having some kind of moment. Where it goes, we can't say, but right here, right now, something significant is happening involving race and in particular, policing. In this limited run series, Baratunde Thurston explains and explores what feels like a defining moment in American history.

When Mitt Romney joins a Black Lives Matter march, when NASCAR bans the Confederate flag, when major cities actually contemplate defunding the police, and when Adidas retweets Nike in support of Black lives, something big is going on.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
I'm Baritun Day Thurston, and I want to tell you
a little bit about this mini series podcast that I'm
doing with my heart. It's called We're Having a Moment,
and it's called that because I think we're having a moment, y'all,
race and policing in America, that kind of moment. And
I've been paying attention to both those things my entire

(00:26):
life out of necessity because I'm black in America and
have been so for forty two years. It feels like
something different is happening now, and it's been an exhausting
a few weeks. I know, I entered this period already
pre exhausted by the coronavirus. Do you remember the coronavirus,

(00:46):
huge global pandemic was changing the way we lived and
work and did everything until America decided there is no
COVID like a trick out of the matrix. So we
did that. We did the coronavirus thing. We're still doing
the coronavirus thing. But in the midst of it, we
were face to face with how ugly things can be
in this country, with how deeply rooted and deadly white

(01:09):
supremacy can rear its head. We saw it in Amy
Cooper and how she was willing to weaponize her access
to law enforcement against Christian Cooper in the ramble in
Central Park, inventing a story that could have ended his life.
And we certainly saw it with Derek Schauvin, who did
end George Floyd's life slowly, obscenely, heartbreaking lee. And out

(01:37):
of that something snapped in me, something probably snapped in you.
And folks hit the streets in record numbers, and not
just the people that were used to seeing hit the streets. Partly,
maybe folks are just excited to get out the house
because we hadn't been able to do that, see a
human being that's not your reflection in the mirror, or

(01:57):
your kid or your partner. But I also think there's
a big part of the reason people showed up to
say enough to say what we've done to this point
hasn't been enough. To say what I saw on that
tape was enough, and I'm not taking it anymore, and

(02:19):
I'm expecting more from myself and my government. A few
weeks ago, the number one books that were selling and
being borrowed from libraries were like about making sour dough.
Now it's all how to be an anti racist and
white fragility. That's good. You know they cancel cops and
aunt Jemima in the same week, that's good. And mayors

(02:43):
across the land, and governors and even maybe the US
Congress starting to rein in our particular peculiar form of
what we call policing because it doesn't it turns out
aligned very well often enough with public safety. We're in

(03:04):
a special time. We're having a moment. I feel like
in a couple of hundred years the descendants of Lynn
Manuel Miranda will sing songs about this moment, especially if
we play it right. But first we've got to know
that it's happening. So that's what I plan to do.
I'm gonna break down what the elements of this moment are,

(03:25):
why they matter. I'm gonna define things like what does
defund the police really mean. I'm gonna examine who's allowed
to protest in this country and is there a right way,
because from what I can see, when a black person kneels,
that's too disrespectful, and a black person marches, that's too disrespectful.
When a black person burns something, it's too disrespectful. When

(03:47):
all of that is in defense of their life against
the state. But if a white person wants a haircut
and shows up to the state House with an a
R fifteen, well they're patriots and they win and the
government literally shuts down. So we're gonna talk about that.
We're going to talk to people who are experts in
some of these things. And it's a short run series,

(04:09):
so I'm not gonna ask for your whole life. This
isn't years. Check out. We're having a moment again. I'm
Barrett to Day Thurston. You can listen to We're having
a Moment on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast
and wherever you get your podcast.